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Transition Day Dawns In The US

Aug 3, 2010  - Craig Lord

The message came from the man who played a pivotal role in the decision of the FINA Executive to press for a January 1, 2010 ban on shiny suits: on the eve of US nationals and trials for Pan Pacs plus - an event that will complete the pre--big-international form guide - Michael Phelps told US media: "I've said this before and I'll say it again: It's really going to be interesting to see who can make the transition. It's going to show who is willing to put in more work, to be able to be in better physical shape. You're not going to be able to float as easy on top of the water. I just think it's going to be interesting to see some of the times you'll see this week."

Today in Irvine, California, is the day that the best of the best swimming nation in the world gather in battle for places on the national team bound for Pan Pacific Championships and for an early thumbs up as far as the likelihood of racing in Stars and Stripes at the world championships in Shanghai next year goes (results at Pan Pacs back in Irvine later this month could towards final Shanghai selection).

More than Phelps, it was his coach Bob Bowman who cracked the whip at FINA. Congress had declared overwhelmingly "enough - suits that enhance performance and skew the result sheet and damage fairness in the race pool must go", and yet the FINA top brass dithered, saying at first that May 2010 might be a starting point for change, for a period of transition to help suit makers (not swimmers, we noted at the time) come to terms with the loss of props that made for a dubious market in goods handed out freely to those who could afford them; used sparingly by those forced to buy; and unattractive to the vast bulk of the buying public that dons a suit for sport, fitness and summer fun.

Then came the 200m free final in which Paul Biedermann (GER) went from a 1:46.00 pb to a 1:42.00 pb and world record that rocketed him beyond Phelps in the water and on the clock. Bowman talked about a chat he had had with Doug Frost and how many long years of work to hone the skills of young teens called Ian Thorpe and Michael Phelps, two of the greatest athletes we have ever seen, had been wiped out by a suit. It had, Bowman noted, taken many years of painstaking work to get Phelps down from 1:46 to 1:44 (just below 1:44 in Melbourne to take down Thorpe's best by a figernail/just under 1:43 with a LZR Racer in 2008). Now, here was a man who could go 1:46 to 1:42, a man whose coach, Frank Embacher in Halle near Leipzig, reckoned that donning a suit made a 0.7sec a length difference. Game over. Phelps would not appear at any FINA event until the poison had been removed.

And removed it was: January 1, no more non-textile, no more bodysuits. Fairness returned and the swimmer and his/ger work with the coach took the spotlight once more. Over the next five days, we will see how that plays out in the US on the clock (at the least). The coach and swimmer took stock not on January 1 but back in Rome: Phelps never wore anything but textile and jammers since. 

"From my standpoint, it makes the coaching more significant in the process because your errors in the taper ... it used to be if you were off in the taper, you'd put the suit on, and it kind of covered it up," Bowman told the LA Times.

There are those who suggest that the cold turkey of no records after the drug of 255 global standards (a handful disallowed in the chaos of flip-flop decisions) will be too much for broadcasters and public to bear. Phelps begs to differ. "I still think you're going to see tight races. For me, I'd rather see a tight race than watch a world record get obliterated by five seconds," said the most prolific setter of world records in history, whose count, said Bowman back in Rome, ought to stop at February 2008 and start again from January 1, 2010, if justice were to be done. 

FINA dithers yet on records on the eve of the big broadcast season and all those red lines that race ahead of swimmers in most, maybe all, races, in some cases by margins that will surely require those broadcasting to explain a fair few times to the viewer why swimmers have got slower. Of course, swimmers have not got slower. They will be just as fast, or faster - but the suit will no longer be taking them to places they could not get to off their own work and steam.

Phelps is ome way off putting his London 2012 Olympic swansong in place: in Irvine, he avoids the 100m free and focusses on four of his Olympic gold-medal events - 200m freestyle, the 100 and 200m butterfly, 200m medley - and 200m backstroke, which come the last day of trials will deliver a much anticipated clash with Olympic and world champions current and past, Ryan Lochte (Beijing 2008 champ, Melbourne 2007 champ) and Aaron Peirsol (Rome 2009 champ, Athens 2004 champ).

Of late, the most successful Olympian of all time has chastised himself for being a little "lazy". His form is not what it should be and he admitted to having skipped too many moments of intensity in the water. Yet the drag of the years is wearing off now that race season and the summer are here: "I think I'm more motivated now than I have been all year. Not being where you want to be is frustrating. At the same time, I brought this on myself."

True to his Beijing word, no 400m medley for Phelps. And the man who took Phelps's 200m medley WR last year, Ryan Lochte, might be off the multi mission in the solo sense too after having sustained a groin injury when swimming breaststroke last week. Lochte will be a force to reckon with in the 100m, 200m 400m free and the 100m and 200m backstrokes.

Among women, among most anticipated moments are the efforts of Rebecca Soni and where the breaststroke buck stops ahead of a showdown with Leisel Jones (AUS); Dana Vollmer has been another queen of consistency this season; Natalie Coughlin makes her return to top flight focus; Katie Hoff is on the up once more; Ariana Kukors may not get down to that 2:06 but she will want the gauntlet to fall well within 2:10 in the 200 IM; all eyes will be on the London 2012 generation including Dagny Knutson and the two Elizabeths, Pelton and Beisel. 

One of the key themes in the women's race pool after the 2008 and 2009 seasons is whether Americans can claw back the losses sustained at an Olympic Games and world championships that placed European women at the helm of the sport. Irvine will provide a big clue as to where the USA intends to start its strike back.