Olympic gold medalist Ryan Held competed at the BSL Iron City Invite this weekend in Birmingham, Ala., near his training base in Tuscaloosa, and he recorded impressive times in the 50 and 100 free. In the 50 free Saturday, Held swam a time of 21.62, improving on his previous lifetime best of 21.87 from the 2019 Summer Nationals. With that time, Held is now ranked second in the world for 2021 behind Vladimir Morozov (21.41).
Held also improved to a tie for second in the U.S. during the Olympic Trials qualifying period with Michael Andrew. Caeleb Dressel ranks first at 21.04. Held also beat out the winning time in the event from the TYR Pro Swim Series in Mission Viejo.
In Sunday’s 100 free, Held swam a time of 48.68, good for 14th in the world rankings. He currently ranks second in the U.S. during the Trials qualifying period with a 47.39, also from the 2019 Summer Nationals. That beat Nathan Adrian’s 100 free winning time of 48.74 from the Mission Viejo Pro Swim Series as well as the 48.68 that Dressel swam in Saturday evening’s prelims.
Held is seen as a strong contender to qualify for his second straight U.S. Olympic team in the 100 free, where six swimmers will be taken to Tokyo to compete in the 400 free relay. Held provided the third leg on the gold-medal winning American relay at the 2016 Olympics in Rio.
Additionally, Held swam a 1:49.12 in the 200 free, and he was scheduled to compete in the 100 fly but was listed as being DQ’ed.
Who is his coach?
Was he tapered?