Photo Courtesy: David Rieder
After a stellar summer in which he won a pair of gold medals at the Olympic Games in Rio, Caeleb Dressel has returned to college swimming, and the Florida junior already has posted the top times in the country in the 50 free, 100 free and 100 fly.
Dressel would be honored Monday night at Golden Goggles for his efforts on the men’s 400 free relay, but before winning that award, he spoke about his transition back to college swimming and where he thinks he is at this point in the season. He also explained some of his adventures as a tourist in Manhattan earlier in the day.
While it is highly commendable Caeleb wNts to be a ” regular college student” I hope he also has eye on the prize, I.e., a gold- medal, or two or even three (four?) and a world record or two,or three or more @. Tokyo, if not before.
Oh and a sub-18.0 50 yard free and a sub 40.0 100 (and even a sub- 43.0 100 fly) would cement his reputation as ” greatest” collegiate swimmer — not just
“sprinter”” but SWIMMER — of all- tine!
I do admit Caeleb is an amazing swimmer. No one will be able to catch him in the 50 yard free and 100 yard free. But, to say he is the greatest sprinter is saying too much at this point. He certainly is an amazing sprinter, but he has not achieved first place in any of the sprint events at the Olympic level. As of now he certainly isn’t the greatest swimmer of all time. To be honest it will be a long time before any swimmer can accomplish what Michael Phelps has achieved (arguably the greatest swimmer of all time, I’m pretty sure most people would agree with me).