Swimming, Glorious Swimming

[mspart]

Watched a little swimming.   I like swimming.   Not as much as wrestling.  

mspart

[Wrestleknownothing]

Watching Katie Ledecky swim a 1500 is amazing. She won her heat by something like 30 meters. 

[Wrestleknownothing]

And the announcer brought up wrestling during swimming. I had to wipe away a tear.

[Ohio Elite]

 

[mspart]

Poor guy.   That would be embarrassing.   He knew it was bad the moment he left the board. 

mspart

[Wrestleknownothing]

After a very quiet morning session (three sets of heats) we get a jam packed evening session with five finals and three semifinals.

Finals

• Women's 111 free
• Men's 200 fly
• Women's 1500 free
• Men's 200 breast
• Men's 100 free

Semis

• Women's 200 fly
• Men's 200 back
• Women's 200 breast

While all of the races are important (it is swimming after all, the highest form of sport) the Women's 1500 is the biggest deal with Katie Ledecky the prohibitive favorite, though she swam a slowish prelim and was only 4 seconds better than the second best time.

[Wrestleknownothing]

Katie Freakin Ledecky

[Paul158]

1 minute ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

Katie Freakin Ledecky

She has the top 20 times in the 1500. Thats amazing. She has 2 more events to go. WKN, how does her chances look in the 800 and then in the relay?

[Wrestleknownothing]

3 minutes ago, Paul158 said:

She has the top 20 times in the 1500. Thats amazing. She has 2 more events to go. WKN, how does her chances look in the 800 and then in the relay?

The 800 is pretty close to a lock also. The only person to beat her in the last decade plus, Summer McIntosh, is not swimming it in this Olympics. The 4x200 is always competitive. It will be a dogfight with the Australians and Chinese. The Aussies are favored followed by the Chinese.

[Wrestleknownothing]

Can we get the men's college wrestlers to go to the women's swimmers for media training? Sarah Sjostrom and Katie Ledecky gave two of the best post race interviews ever.

[ionel]

1 hour ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

Katie Freakin Ledecky

Is she related to Spencer Freakin Lee? 

[Paul158]

1 hour ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

Can we get the men's college wrestlers to go to the women's swimmers for media training? Sarah Sjostrom and Katie Ledecky gave two of the best post race interviews ever.

Good idea . It would also be a good idea to give the wrestler 10 to 15 minutes to catch their breath and gather their thoughts. They usually stick a mic in their face right away.

[Wrestleknownothing]

Yowza. The Australian women's 4x200 free team had the fastest prelim time by almost 7 seconds. And they did it without the two fastest 200 free swimmers ever, who also happen to be the gold and silver medalists in these games. They could conceivably go 8 seconds faster in the final.

[Wrestleknownothing]

Another interesting story is COVID. A lot of COVID going through the aquatics events....and it is fine.

The latest to announce a positive test is 200 breaststroke silver medalist Zac Stubblety-Cook. ZSC is at least the eighth swimmer to test positive. And five Aussie women's water polo players tested positive.

It is nice to see this being a marginal story at most.

[Bigbrog]

I see the US won gold in the coxless four final...so many jokes to be said...

[Wrestleknownothing]

36 minutes ago, Bigbrog said:

I see the US won gold in the coxless four final...so many jokes to be said...

[Bigbrog]

Just watched Simone Biles do her floor routine and win the all-around...UNBELIEVABLE!!!  So lucky to have been able to see such an athlete compete.

[ionel]

If there's a tie in the finals what do they do? 

[Wrestleknownothing]

40 minutes ago, ionel said:

If there's a tie in the finals what do they do? 

two medals, I believe

[ionel]

Ledecky got em back in it in the relay.  

[Wrestleknownothing]

1 hour ago, ionel said:

Ledecky got em back in it in the relay.  

Yeah, Australia is just so loaded in the 200 that it was only ending one way. For the US to stay within 3 seconds was a surprise.

Now we still have a Ledecky 800 and Finke 1500 to look forward to.

[Wrestleknownothing]

Ledecky takes care of business this morning by earning the top seed for the 800 final with a relatively pedestrian time. While she is a big favorite this will still be a tough final.

The men continue to under-perform. Josh Heilman goes over a second slower than his trials time in the 100 fly and doesn't even make the semis. Oof.

[mspart]

6 hours ago, Wrestleknownothing said:

The men continue to under-perform. Josh Heilman goes over a second slower than his trials time in the 100 fly and doesn't even make the semis. Oof.

Sounds like OK State wrestling lately!!!  ha ha

mspart

[ionel]

But how bout that glorious 10k?   

[Wrestleknownothing]

10 minutes ago, ionel said:

But how bout that glorious 10k?   

By land or by sea? I am interested in the e-colympics.