Australia: Grant Stoelwinder, the last coach of Libby Trickett, has suggested that top swimmers take a year's break to beat burnout. Speaking to Michael Cowley at The Sydney Morning Herald the day after 24-year-old Trickett announced her retirement, Stoelwinder said: "Maybe the only thing I would think of, in trying to prolong careers and stop burnout, is perhaps managing [the amount of] competitions [they contest] a little better, and maybe getting them to take a year off after the Olympics. It hasn't just become a four-year [Olympic] cycle, there are world championships [long and short course, both held every two years], and Pan Pacs [the Pan Pacific Swimming Championships], and Commonwealth Games, maybe that's what we do, arrange the competitions a bit better for some of the older athletes. The way it is now, there is no time for them to have a break or to finish a university course - Libby wants to get her [communications] degree - and as much as you try to help manage this, it's hard. I think we can organise them to take six months or nine or 12 months off." Meanwhile, the dangerous baby sprint shark among Dolphins, Cate Cambpell clocked 53.17 at Queensland state titles in a last shiny suit blast. And second was Yolane Kukla, 14, and on and Aussie age group record time of 54.99. Kukla's coach Mick Palfrey told AAP: "Yo Yo (Yolane) will definitely be having a crack at the Commonwealth Game Trials." In the 200m butterfly Jess Schipper clocked 2:07.99 to finish second to Samantha Hamill (2:07.74), with Britain's Australia-based Ellen Gandy third in 2:08.85. Ryan Napoleon won the 1,500m free in 15:20.90 and Australian record holder Meagen Nay won the 200m backstroke in 2:08.44.
Zimbabwe: The Herald/All Africa Global Media has chosen Kirsty Coventry as Zimbabwe's best athlete of 2009 across all sports ahead of boxer Tineyi Mharidzo, Tineyi Mharidzo African super-middleweight champion and a man who shares the same name as the swimming ace, Charles Coventry, a world-class cricketer. Coventry of race waters also won top Female Sportspersons of the Year, while the Zimbabwean junior swim team was voted third-best sports team of the year.
Britain: Hannah Miley, fresh from win ing the 400m medley crown at the European short-course championships in Istanbul is looking forward to the Duel in the Pool against the US this week and thinks that times will be fast at what will be the last outing of silly suits before the January 1, 2010 ban on stuff that belongs in the trash can of history. Miley told her local media in Grampian: “It’s definitely going to be fun but tough, and I am really looking forward to racing against these girls [from the US as well as alongside German and Italian E-Stars teammates]. It’s the last meet of the year and it would be good to finish on a high. It’s a great opportunity and I am really pleased to have the chance to take part.” The suits will be worn by some one last time, though not by Michael Phelps (good for him) and some of his teammates, not by Rebecca Adlington (good for her) and some of her teammates. Miley said: “I wore a polyurethane suit in Istanbul just because everyone else was wearing them. I would have disadvantaged myself otherwise." Quite so. Many, of course, swam at a disadvantage at various points along the circus tour in 2008 and 2009.
Australia: Former Dolphin Hayley Lewis, world 200m free champion, Olympic medal winner and former Commonwealth champion, is still in the swim: she will race in the Yamba Surf Life Saving ocean swims at Main Beach on Sunday, December 27. Lewis, from Norman Park in Brisbane, will be swimming with her family and hoping to repeat her win in the women’s 700m and go one better than second in the 2000m last year, she told the Northern Star.
