Swimmer's Daily

  • Pál said in an interview yesterday on our Faroese spoken sister-site, that he had entered the 5K here in Berlin to get open water experience, before a possible attempt to reach Rio.

    I’m sure he didn’t mean the kind of experience he got today. Disqualified because of a false start, in a 5K. Ouch.

    This was my first time at a real open water race, and it was quite interesting. A very nice atmosphere in general, but also real upsetting moments like when that Polish girl got in trouble, and of course when Pál was back with us way too early.

    The evening has been spent communicating back to the Faroe Islands, on what went wrong. To cut it real short, we felt he had a good chance in this race, and were calm and confident right up till that moment when his suit ripped about the same time as the final call came for the competitors. So he changed real quick, into a long john suit instead of the bodysuit.

    Pál himself wrote on Facebook tonight

    Had a nightmare of at start to these European Camps. I got disqualified for a false start at the 5k today, which was very irritating, because I had no incentive to cheat, I just didn’t know the start signal well enough. Simply a case of lack of open water experience. But fair is got to be fair, every .01 second counts and this is a gentleman’s sport after all. I’m just glad that the judges stopped me in the first round, so that I didn’t waste to much energy. Which I’m gonna need in the pool later this week. No need to stare into the rear view mirror.

    So yeah, we put this behind us now, and focus on the pool races next week !

  • See len.au

    http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x21er0p_european-swimming-championships-2014-berlin-ger_sport

  • South Africa’s Olympic swimming champion Cameron van der Burgh is hoping to avoid surgery over a troublesome shoulder, saying the next two months will be crucial in determining how to resolve the problem.

    The 26-year-old has been struggling with pain recently as a result of non-stop competition, his most recent being the SA Short Course Swimming Championships in Pietermaritzburg last week.

    “It’s as bad as what you see,” he said.

    “A lot of specialists and surgeons want to operate on it the first time they see it, but I’m taking the rehab route rather.

    “For the next six weeks, I’ll try and relax, lay lower and do a lot of rehab on the shoulder. It’s more the irritation than the injury. If I can just get rid of that then it’ll be okay.”

    Read The Citizen

  • So I have travelled all day today, and am knackered. Pál says breakfast is at 7 AM, which is 6 AM in the time zone I left this morning, so I’d better go to bed now. Just a few words before bedtime.

    (more…)

  • Interesting detail out of a LEN press release today

    LEN Sports Office Manager Marco Birri revealed that LEN would provide live streaming of each and every session of all four disciplines. “We will even have cameras broadcasting those events which are not covered by the host broadcaster, including the synchro preliminaries.” The live webcasting will be available on the LEN website (www.len.eu) for all competition days for free.

    See len.eu

  • Olympic champion Chad Le Clos walks us through his preparation for competition including his coaches final words before he won gold at the London 2012 Games.

  • Some slow motion highlights of the 2014 Phillips 66 National Championships – produced by takeitlive.tv

  • 4-time Olympic rowing gold medalist Matthew Pinsent travels to South Africa to meet with Olympic champion Chad Le Clos, discussing Chad’s training schedule his coaching and family life in this amazing interview.

  • French freediver David Helder has been diving for over 35 years, and somewhere along the way he discovered a strange ability. Like a dolphin, Helder can blow perfectly controlled bubble rings underwater. While many divers have playfully experimented with blowing these whirling vortexes, Helder has dedicated significant time to perfecting the technique which he uses to perform dozens of different tricks.

    See Colossal