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By Michael J. Stott
Day four prelims are in the books. Optimism abounds among top five coaches. In fifth place after Day Three, Georgia coach Jack Bauerle said, “We had a great morning. We got in three guys who weren’t supposed to score.”
After a less-than-hoped-for Friday prelims NC State mentor Braden Holloway opined, “it was a good morning.”
And it could be an even better evening if his top-seeded 400 free relay retains its position.
“We are tired of finishing second,” he said. The Pack’s foursome of Ryan Held, Simonas Bilis, Andreas Schiellerup and Soeren Dahl posted a pool record of 2:47.36 to break the 2006 Arizona mark of 2:48.39.
Pack fortunes could be even brighter if they hold on to fourth. To do that, they will rely on Hennessey Stuart keeping the fifth spot in the 200 back, Bilis retaining top seed in the 100 free (pool record 41.59) and Christian McCurdy staying at least sixth in the 200 fly. At the moment, NC State is 35 points ahead of Georgia and 58 behind third-place Florida.
First-place Texas strengthened its near stranglehold on first.
Coach Eddie Reese’s assessment was simple and precise.
“We got every spot we could get,” adding “we’re about four or five days from being really rested.”
Tonight’s program is littered with Longhorns in every final with diving positions yet to be determined. Texas will have two top eight seeds (Clark Smith, Townley Haas) in the timed final 1650, a race which may determine whether the Texas freshman wins the coveted swimmer of the meet award.
When asked during mid-morning how much warmup he was going to do the lanky, laconic phenom responded “I don’t know. I haven’t decided. I have a relay.”
For those scoring at home, Haas’ 42.43 relay leadoff was third fastest of the morning behind Florida’s Caeleb Dressel (41.54) and Bilis (41.79).
Then What
National Team Director Frank Busch applauds the eye that American coaches seem to have when assessing and training their swimmers. Nowhere is this more evident than in the warm-down pool following prelims. Swimming World used this morning’s sessions to talk to some coaches about how they approach and deal with post-competition swims.
Regarding stroke adjustment after a swim Holloway says he offers “almost none. I may say something about a stroke or kick count, but nothing regarding technique. Not now. If I do, I overcoach and it gives the swimmer too much to think about.”
Short and sweet was the majority opinion. Wisconsin coaches Whitney Hite and Ray Collier were supervising their Badgers when Hite offered that he might mention “one thing, nothing more. At this point we are managing emotions. It’s useless if I try to talk technique and they are still caught up what they just did.”
Warm down length is critical, “1500 to two grand,” says Hite. “Twenty five minutes — really slow. They need to flush out the lactic acid,” says Collier. In a dual meet, swimmers might only go 500 given the pace of the meet.
“Here it is more intense,” he says.
Arizona State’s Bob Bowman tries to get athletes in the water “as quick as we can. Then we talk to them and that conversation depends upon how they did. If they have a swim tonight, we’ll look at what they did and suggest some things that might make them faster tonight. This morning my guy didn’t have a good swim. His time at an Arizona State dual meet would have put him eighth here… so we’ll just let it go.”
Princeton head man Rob Orr, veteran of many Ivy League and NCAA wars, agrees with Bowman that the comments he makes depend upon the individuals.
“To some you can say technical things,” others not so much. “If I had more answers, we’d have more finalists,” he says.
Tennessee has finalists in the 200 back (Sean Lehane) and a relay qualified for the final evening. Volunteer assistant Tyler Fenwick has worked with Bill Rose at Mission Viejo and swam for Dick Shoulberg at Germantown Academy. He has seen a lot of warm downs.
“Trying to give feedback before a warm down is stupid,” he says. “Swimmers are out of breath and not focused. I need to get them into the pool and warm down. Length of that warm down depends on the event. For a 200 butterfly, it would easily be 25 minutes, then a rubdown and a cold tub. Later we’ll look at video, review and try to get them ready for tonight.”
In all likelihood the Volunteers will be ready for tonight.
“Our men are just killing it,” says Fenwick. “This is our best performance in 15 years. While our divers are doing well (Liam Stone and Mauricio Robles Rodriguez finished first and fourth in the 1-meter and ninth and 11th in the three meter) they only account for about 20 percent of our points.”
Truth be told going into tonight’s finals the divers have accounted for 51 of 152 (just over a third) of Tennessee’s sixth place points with the platform prelims not yet completed.
Hotlanta will really be burning tonight. With Ryan Murphy set to close out a superlative career and Townley Haas and the Longhorns looking to lead Eddie Reese to a record 12 men’s title things should be sizzling in the 1996 Olympic pool.
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Great write up.
“With Ryan Murphy set to close out a superlative career …”
Ryan is a Junior.
Did I miss some announcement about turning pro after the NCAA (a/l/a Missy Franklin last year)?