Even though Song Hong-seon, researcher at the Korea Institute of Sport Science according to dongA says that “in the men’s 400-meter freestyle, the winner will be determined by a competition of strategies”, it sounds to me like both Park Tae-hwan and Sun Yang are preparing an all-out sprint from the get-go.
Analysts say that having judged he failed to properly cope with Park’s early spurt, Sun will have undergone ample training stressing aggressiveness and cut his 50-meter lap time from the very beginning. As a result, he has seen his times rapidly improve in recent months thanks to these training sessions.
In other Korean news, Park’s manager says that he is adding the 100 freestyle to his usual repertoire of the 200 and 400 freestyle, at the Shanghai World Championships. This is buoyed by his recent run in the 100, where he at Santa Clara International 2011 edged Michael Phelps himself to take the 100 meter crown at 48.92 seconds.
