Swimmer's Daily

  • Read Yle

    An elderly Russian swimmer who participated in the World Winter Swimming Championship in Rovaniemi, northern Finland has passed away. The man competed in the 450-metre endurance race in the 70 – 74-year old age group.

    The veteran Russian swimmer took ill while competing while competing during the competition’s opening day on March 20. He was given first aid on the scene and later taken to the Oulu University Hospital.

    The local travel and tour company Rovaniemi Tourism and Marketing announced Tuesday that the swimmer later died and that his relatives were informed of his passing.

  • Read Sydney Morning Herald

    Some sporting careers do not travel the easiest path, and so it is with Melanie Schlanger, for whom it would not seem normal if she was not battling an illness or injury in preparation for a major competition.

    Schlanger has defied doctor’s orders to compete in Brisbane this week at the selection trials for the Glasgow Commonwealth Games.

    The 27-year-old has been hampered for the past 18 months by illness and rib and shoulder injuries that forced her withdrawal from last year’s world championships team.

    She damaged another rib earlier this year and was told to rest for six weeks. But with less than three months to the selection trials, she decided to push ahead with her preparation to give herself the best chance to qualify for the Australian team at the Commonwealth Games.

  • Read Brandon Sun

    Ryan Cochrane’s illustrious swimming career, he says, has come down to a “lot of lasts.”

    He’ll compete at the Canadian swimming trials this weekend in Victoria to make the team for what will be his last Commonwealth Games.

    Next summer will mark his last world championships. The 2016 Rio Games will be his last Olympics.

    “The four years between Beijing and London (Olympics) went by like a whirlwind and I think the older you get the faster those years go by, so I’m just trying to make sure I make the most of all these last chances I get,” Cochrane said. “It’s kind of narrowing down … it’s an exciting prospect but you also have to be ready for the final chances you have at representing yourself and putting all this work you worked so hard for to good use.”

  • Read ninemsn

    For someone who has contemplated retirement, Alicia Coutts can’t seem to stop thinking about swimming.

    Even when the five-time London Olympic medallist sat down to plan her 2015 wedding the sport seemed to creep into her subconscious.

    Coutts, 26, has adopted a year-by-year approach despite being inspired by a post-2012 Olympic chat with former champion Susie O’Neill.

    However, Coutts appears to have already made her mind up about powering onto the 2015 world titles in Russia – she just didn’t realise it straight away.

    “I have scheduled my wedding around the world championships next year. I must be really contemplating contesting the worlds,” she laughed.

    “And Rio (Olympics 2016) are only another few months away from that so maybe I can do that – we will see.”

  • See The Local via Arbroath

    Spanish daily ABC reported that the Ciudad Real woman had been having sexual relations with a man when the cover on a waterwheel well shaft became dislodged.

    She plunged 10 metres into the hole near ‘Playa Park’ – a waterpark popular with local youths as a venue for romantic liaisons and ‘botellón’ outdoor drinking parties – before hitting the water.

    It is believed that the couple had inadvertently loosened the boards covering the well while making love and had been too distracted to notice the impending peril.

    The young man did not, unfortunately, respond in a manner likely to inspire writers of romantic songs and novels.

    Instead of trying to rescue his unfortunate partner, he hitched up his trousers and fled the scene.

    (more…)

  • See ABC Action News, via Arbroath

    “I saw big nostrils going underwater and staying underwater with water blowing out,” Ammons said. An animal lover herself, she didn’t hesitate to jump into the retention pond to rescue the bull.

    “I stripped everything off that the sheriff’s office really cares about,” she joked. “And then I got in.”

    For the next three hours, Ammons and her partners kept holding the bull’s head above the water’s surface as Hillsborough County Fire Rescue brought a truck with a winch and slowly attached the bull to several straps.

    Slowly but surely, the winch tugged the bull to safety.

    “I’m amazed that the deputy was able to hold his head up out of that water,” said Charles Cochran, the bull’s owner. “You’re looking at several hundred pounds.”

  • jacco-verhaerenRead globalpost

    New coach Jacco Verhaeren says a world 100-metre freestyle record is possible for James Magnussen in this week’s Australian Commonwealth Games swimming trials in Brisbane.

    Brazilian Cesar Cielo holds the world record at 46.91 seconds from the 2009 Rome world championships, but Dutchman Verhaeren says Magnussen is at a “fantastic level” ahead of Tuesday’s six-day selection trials.

    Magnussen, the world 100m champion, has clocked four sub-48 second times ahead of the trials and is FINA’s top-ranked sprinter in the event with a year’s best time of 47.59 set in Perth in late January. His personal best is 47.10.

    “It’s hard to talk about times but he’s at a fantastic level,” Verhaeren said ahead of the trials.

  • Read The Roar

    I don’t think I’m showing my age too much, but surely you remember when swimming was Australia’s ‘it’ sport.

    I’m not just talking about our fascination every four years when the pool becomes our Olympic river of gold – or silver or bronze – but a time when everyone seemed to talk about speedos, splits and strokes, and the chase of the elusive red (or sometimes yellow) world record line.

    Who remembers watching Daryl and Ossie on Hey Hey It’s Saturday, only to be interrupted by a live cross to the Aquatic Centre to watch the 1,500m final at the national titles? Honest, it did happen.

    We would be glued to the box to watch each of the 30 laps Kieren Perkins would swim, each butterfly stroke of Susie O’Neill and breaststroke of Sam Riley.

    It was just what we did.

    australia swimming photoPhoto by blackplastic

  • See digg

    A teenage Michael Phelps talks about his goal of winning Olympic gold medals like you talk about just finishing a 5K.