Swimming legend Janet Evans broke two world masters records on Saturday, in her first competition since the 1996 Olympic Games. First, Evans clocked 4:23.82 in the 400 meter freestyle, besting the previous world record for the 35-39 age group of 4:26.17, set in 1997. And then later, she shattered the world masters record in her the 800 meter freestyle, clocking 8:59.06, more than 10 seconds faster than the previous record. รย Via The Orange County Register.
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Swimmers are bigger today, says Thorpe
Five-time Australian Olympic swimming champion Ian Thorpe cannot return to competition before November, but came to the Mare Nostrum 2011 meet in Monaco with coach Gennadi Tourtski from his training base at Tenero in Switzerland.
Asked how he sees his current capabilities compared with when he dominated the sport, he says “I’m physically not ready to know how well I can swim. I’m working on it. Towards the end of the year, I’ll be able to answer more directly.” And then he notes that swimmers have grown since then.
“The biggest difference is physically people have changed. People are bigger than they used to be because I used to be the biggest person and I realize people are bigger than me, and the men, the women, it’s a lot more power.”
Even so he insists there will always be more to swiming than power and physical strength alone.
“There’s a balance between being too muscular and being restricted by that. Swimming is swimming.”
Source: AFP
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Women’s 200 IM at Mare Nostrum Barcelona 2011
Womens’ 200 individual medley at the 32รยจ Trofeu Internacional Ciutat de Barcelona de Nataciรยณ 2011. Australia’s Alicia Coutts wins in 2:09.68, Spanish Mireia Belmonte is 2nd in 2:12.55, and Great Britain’s open water swimmer Keri-Anne Payne is 3rd in 2:13.99. Coutts’ winning time was the best female performance on the Barcelona leg (934 FINA points), for which she was named Barcelona 2011 cup winner alongside Japan’s Ryosuke Irie.
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Janet Evans is making a comeback (!)
Janet Evans walked away from swimming after the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, with her gold medals and world records that stood for many many years, morphed into a spokeswoman, got married and had two kids. Now in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press, 39-year-old Evans revealed that she’s been training hard for the past six months with an eye on qualifying for the next year’s Olympic trials and, if all goes according to plan, earning a spot on the U.S. team for the London Games 2012. Read more here on newser.com and ap.org.
The first official test for Evans will come this weekend at the Janet Evans Invitational Masters meet in Fullerton, Calif. According to the Associated Press article, Evans will swim the 400- and 800-meter freestyles – events in which she held the world record – as well as the 200 freestyle and 200 backstroke. This will be Evans’ first competition since the 1996 Olympics. See www.swimmingworldmagazine.com.
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Cayman’s Brett Fraser receives kudos for brain power
Two-time NCAA swimming champion and Olympianรย Brett Fraser from the Cayman Islands has now also earned recognition as an Academic All-American. To be considered for that award, a student-athlete must have achieved a cumulative GPA of at least 3.30, be at least a sophomore academically and be a starter or key player on the team. Brett was named to the third team after achieving an impressive 3.43 GPA in finance, also making it onto the academic honor roll three times.
รขโฌลCongratulations to Brett. He is the ultimate role model. Not only is he pushing the limits with his swimming, but he is showing every aspiring student that academics neednรขโฌโขt lag behind,รขโฌย Sports Minister Mark Scotland said. รขโฌลWe are proud to have someone like Brett represent us on the world stage and wish him well for the future.รขโฌย
Read CaymanNewsService and gatorzone.com
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This is how swimmers do pushups (!)
Yeah yeah, we are slow and dorky and have no balance. Kudos Wolverines !
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Polarized filters are perfect for water shots
If you want to take photos through surface glare into water, or just want to cut down surface glare, you are going to need a polarized filter. This otherwise beautiful video doesn’t demonstrate exactly that perfectly, so I added a comparison photo that demonstrates it better. By the way, you can get the same effect by wearing sunglasses with polarization, which might explain why so many swimming coaches use them. Via PetaPixel.Polarizing Filters for Photo and Video from Olivia Speranza on Vimeo.
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Someone trying out the new Michael Phelps video game
The 17thman has found this video of someone from gaygamer.net trying out the new “Michael Phelps: Push The Limit” game for Xbox 360 with Kinect. My comment is ‘Oh, the humanity, look at those elbows!’ Seriously, if the game allows you to keep up with the world’s best with that technique, then it is more a matter of getting as many as possible to think that they could be there, than to teach anybody anything.
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The London 2012 Aquatics Centre is getting there
Webcam photo from the interior of the London 2012 Aquatics Centre this morning, see the most recent photo here.
