BUDAPEST — It’s only Day One of the swim action of these 2017 FINA world championships, and here is the dilemma.
How many different ways are there to say Katie Ledecky is great?
In the first final in a meet she is expected to — strike that, absent something freaky, will — dominate, Ledecky set a new championship record in the women’s 400 freestyle, winning by more than three seconds.
RIO de JANEIRO — Of all the images from Michael Phelps’ storied career, perhaps none is as visceral — as open and truthfully honest — as the shot from the finish of the men’s 4x100 freestyle relay at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, a portrait of Phelps screaming to the heavens in raw, primal, triumphant victory.
This was the race in which Jason Lezak somehow willed his way past France’s Alain Bernard. Lezak was behind when he dove in. He was behind at the turn. He was behind until the very end, when he out-touched Bernard in a moment that instantly became an Olympic classic.
Right there on the deck, Phelps, who had set the Americans to the lead in the first leg, roared. Right behind him, Garrett Weber-Gale, who had pulled the second leg in the relay, fists clenched, leaned back and screamed in jubilation. Both guys were in their star-spangled LZR suits.
This is the red, white and blue moment the U.S. swim team lives for.
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-- In advance of the publication in the coming days of highly technical planning details, it’s far-more-interesting logo-unveil time in the 2024 Summer Olympic bid game. Paris, for instance, came out a few days ago with a stylized Eiffel Tower. On Tuesday, Los Angeles unveiled its logo and the tagline, “Follow the sun.” Reaction: let’s be honest here and admit that logos and slogans rarely play a huge role come voting time, with the exception perhaps of the incredibly on-point Pyeongchang 2018 tag, “New Horizons.”
At issue in this 2024 campaign is nothing less the fundamental direction of the Olympic movement: whether the International Olympic Committee is prepared to take LA mayor Eric Garcetti and bid leader Casey Wasserman up on what they said Tuesday to a fired-up crowd on the 30th floor of a downtown skyscraper, the sun setting gloriously to the west. The mayor: “Imagination is critical because it leads to hope. Hope leads to dreams. Dreams lead to innovation. That is the story of our city.” Wasserman said a "sense of relentless reinvention and new beginnings” anchor “LA2024’s distinctive value proposition for the good of the Games and the Olympic movement,” a bid with 97 percent of the venues already in place or planned (canoe slalom still to be figured out).
Let’s be honest some more, because at some point there has to be plain talk about this campaign, and it ought to start now, even though the vote isn’t until 2017 and lots can, and will happen. Right now, Europe — pretty much all of it — is a big question mark. As former U.S. treasury secretary Lawrence Summers wrote in Tuesday’s Washington Post, “These are difficult times in Europe with the refugee crisis, economic weakness, security issues and the rise of populist movements.” There’s LA, and then there’s Paris, Rome and Budapest. This campaign will doubtlessly feature any number of references to Paris mounting a fourth bid. At the same time, it needs to be understood that the LA effort is not just an LA, or SoCal, thing; it is America’s third bid, after New York in 2005 for 2012, Chicago in 2009 for 2016.
Straight talk, continued: logic and common sense say the IOC can hardly run the risk of turning down the three biggest cities in the United States in succession. (Of course, it can do so, and an IOC election can typically prove volatile.) But if LA does not win for 2024, it would be exceptionally problematic — and that is putting it gently — for LA to come back for 2028, or to see any other American city step up. It takes millions of dollars to run a bid, and in the United States that money has to be privately raised. The money is here and now for LA24. Imagine a 2024 loss — and then Wasserman going back to all those he hit up for $1 million apiece and saying, looking at 2028, something like, oh, well, now the IOC is going to treat us fairly. Not going to happen. The time is now.
-- IOC president Thomas Bach was in LA earlier this month, making the rounds after prior visits to Paris, Rome and Budapest, the other cities in the 2024 race. Bach then went up to Silicon Valley for talks.
Reaction: so curious that the far more important purpose of Bach’s California trip, the excursion to Silicon Valley, drew minimal press attention. He met with representatives of Visa, Facebook, Twitter and Google, among others. The IOC needs big-time help in reaching out to young people; it is focused in particular on the launch of the Olympic Channel. If you’re an IOC member, looking at that line-up in California, and there’s a California bid, doesn’t that too comport with logic and common sense?
-- One more LA note. The U.S. Olympic Trials for the marathon went down Saturday on a course that wound around downtown and the University of Southern California campus. Galen Rupp won on the men’s side. Many in the running press (there is such a thing) immediately pointed to the possibility of Rupp, silver medalist in the 10k in London in 2012, running both the 10k and the marathon in Rio.
Reaction: let’s wait to see what the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency has to say in the coming months, if anything, about Rupp and his coach, Alberto Salazar. As Kara Goucher, the women’s fourth-place finisher, said after the race, "Justice is coming."
-- Speaking of the IOC’s purported youth outreach: the Winter Youth Olympic Games in Lillehammer are on.
Reaction: did you notice? Did anyone — like, any teens or 20-somethings? The very best part about the YOG experiment is the Young Reporters program, which has produced a number of promising young stars. There’s also an argument that the Youth Games serve as a petri dish of sorts, allowing the IOC and, perhaps more important, the international sports federations to check out without real peril events such as skateboarding (Nanjing YOG, 2014) and, now in Lillehammer, parkour. Fine. But that’s not the point of YOG, expressed by former IOC president Jacques Rogge in launching it. It’s to connect meaningfully with young people. How’s that going?
-- Speaking of a way that actually works in reaching young people: kudos to organizers, and especially the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Assn., for the Big Air event a few days ago at Boston's Fenway Park. It featured jumps and tricks off a 140-foot ramp set up on the field at the iconic baseball stadium.
Reaction: terrific idea, terrific execution. Great stuff, especially on TV.
-- USA Swimming announces a contract extension, through the end of 2020, for executive director Chuck Wielgus.
Reaction: USA Swimming is one of a handful of well-run national governing bodies, and that is in significant measure due to Wielgus, who is a fundamentally decent human being. Anyone who knows USA Swimming knows Wielgus has wrestled for years now with cancer; he deserves widespread admiration and respect for the soft-spoken courage he has repeatedly shown in public in dealing with significant medical issues. Switching gears: the well-publicized challenges sparked by sexual abuse of young swimmers are not — repeat, not — Chuck Wielgus’ fault. Six years ago, in particular in regard to the comments he made on an ABC 20/20 investigation, was Wielgus at his best when he said he didn’t feel the need to apologize? No. Does an 18-year tenure deserve to be judged by one moment? No. And, now, USA Swimming is way ahead of the curve with its SafeSport program. If you want to criticize Wielgus, he deserves credit, too, for realizing, perhaps belatedly, what was wrong and helping to craft an industry-standard response. What should be Wielgus’ next goal: effecting fundamental change in the USA Swimming governance structure. Simply, the board of directors has too many people; it’s too big and unwieldy. Better for USA Swimming to do what it does best, and be a leader in the field, meaning slim down the board, before something happens — whatever that might be — to compel change under pressure.
-- Michael Phelps shows up in a swim brief and has fun with the Arizona State basketball-game "Curtain of Distraction."
Reaction: you can just tell the guy is happy. Which means: watch out, world. Prediction, absent a huge surprise at the U.S. Trials: five Rio gold medals (200 IM, 200 butterfly, 100 fly, 800 relay, medley relay), and that is no knock on his friend and rival, Ryan Lochte. As long as Lochte continues to pursue the 200 backstroke — at the Olympics, the 200 back final goes down before the 200 IM final on the same night — it’s a lot to ask, particularly of the legs, to go for gold in the 200 IM, too. As for the butterfly events, Chad le Clos of South Africa is a major talent. But in saying last summer after winning the 100 fly at the world championships (Phelps did not swim at the 2015 worlds) that Phelps could “keep quiet now,” le Clos awoke the tiger, and probably foolishly. Phelps has always done best when someone goes and trash talks — ask, in sequence, Ian Thorpe, Ian Crocker and, of course, Milorad Cavic. The x factor for Phelps in Rio: the 400 free relay, one of the signature moments at the Beijing 2008 Games, when Jason Lezak turned in an otherworldly last leg to beat Alain Bernard and the French. For the past couple years, the French have been the world’s best in that event, and it’s not clear, at least yet, that even with Phelps the U.S. has what it takes.
-- The Zika virus takes over the Olympic news cycle, and U.S. soccer women’s national team goalie Hope Solo, among others, expresses concern about being part of it all in Rio.
Prediction: Solo goes to Rio.
-- Two former officials with the Russian anti-doping agency, which goes by the acronym RUSADA, die within two weeks. Founding chairman Vyacheslav Sinev, who left RUSADA in 2010, died Feb. 3. Then this past Sunday, Feb. 14, the former RUSADA executive director Nikita Kamaev, died, just 52, of a “massive heart attack,” the agency said. Kamaev had resigned just two months ago, amid the doping scandal that sparked suspension of the Russian track and field program. That scandal is tied, in part, to a November report from a World Anti-Doping Agency commission that suggested state-sponsored doping. On Feb. 11, three days before Kamaev’s death, the Russian prosecutor-general’s office (predictably) rejected the WADA commission report, saying it held no concrete facts proving state-sponsored doping.
Reaction: it's like a Russian novel, full of twists and turns and who knows what. For that matter: who knows, really, what is believed to be real in Russia, and what is not? This prediction, though: like Hope Solo, the Russian track and field team will be in Rio. The IOC is super-big on a concept called “universality,” which means everyone in the entire world coming together. It’s actually a fundamental rationale for the Games. Given that, how possibly can officials — in particular track and field’s international governing body, the IAAF, or more, the IOC — keep the Russian track and field team away? Also: who really wants to challenge Vladimir Putin, given the potential for many uncertain ramifications?
-- U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia dies over the weekend at a ranch in Texas.
Reaction: what might that have to do with sports? Turn to a case called Crawford vs. Washington, decided in 2004. The 6th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution says that in a criminal case, the defendant “shall enjoy the right … to be confronted with the witnesses against him.” What does that mean when someone makes a “testimonial” statement out-of-court but doesn’t (that is, can’t, for instance because of illness, or won’t, because of the assertion of privilege) testify in court itself? Writing for a unanimous 9-0 court, Scalia said the “testimonial” statement can’t be admitted as evidence — unless the defendant had a prior opportunity to cross-examine the person who made that statement.
So, again: sports? The U.S. Department of Justice inquiry into corruption at FIFA centers on Chuck Blazer, the American who was formerly a high-ranking soccer-world executive. Blazer reportedly has been ill for years with colon cancer. What if he dies before any trial? Would anything he had to say be admissible? For that matter, U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch has already been prominently mentioned as a potential Scalia replacement. Would the Justice Department be so interested in aggressively pursuing soccer stuff if someone else took over?
Michael Phelps is not a bad guy. Let’s start there. In fact, he’s a really, really good guy. He cares — deeply — about his family, his coaches, the people who have been with him for years, his hometown, his country and his sport. He is, genuinely, great with kids. He is, truly, a normal guy who found a genius for swimming and competing.
By driving drunk, according to the allegations levied against him by the authorities in Maryland, Michael made a really bad mistake. Perhaps the hardest piece: Michael has said many, many times, often to audiences of kids, that it’s OK to make a mistake — the trick is not to make the same mistake twice. Now, in the wake of his DUI problem 10 years ago, he has made the very same mistake, all over again.
The separate DUI incidents — of course, Michael is entitled to the presumption of innocence in regard to his arrest this week — are compounded by the 2009 episode in which he was photographed with his face in a bong.
Phelps was stopped at 1:40 a.m. Tuesday after leaving the brand-new Horseshoe Casino in downtown Baltimore, allegedly going 84 in a 45 zone. His blood-alcohol level was a reported 0.14, above the legal limit of 0.08.
The incident leads to all manner of questions, concerns and what-to-do’s — for Michael, USA Swimming, the U.S. Olympic Committee, Michael’s sponsors and everyone anywhere with an interest in the greatest Olympic athlete of all time.
That is, indisputably, what Michael is.
And that, actually, is at the core of all of this.
Michael is 29 now. Old enough, assuredly smart enough to know better, to have the judgment to call Uber. A taxi. A friend. Something or someone.
Michael’s first DUI came when he was 19, in November 2004, after the Athens Games. At that time in his life, as he has said, post-Games he had no structure, no routine. He was on a road trip to Maryland’s Eastern Shore with a friend. He had three beers. His blood-alcohol reading was precisely 0.08.
He pleaded guilty a month later in Salisbury, Maryland, to driving while impaired; was ordered to pay $305 in fines and court costs; to attend a meeting of Mothers Against Drunk Driving; and to speak at a number of schools about drinking, driving and decision-making.
USA Swimming did not suspend him.
The experience would lead Michael to Greg Harden, the longtime associate athletic director and director of athletic counseling at the University of Michigan. Harden gave Michael the advice that Michael would internalize, would make his own, would repeat as if it were a mantra:
It’s OK to make a mistake. Whenever you make a mistake, learn from it. If you learn from a mistake, you’ll be fine. Just don’t make the same mistake twice.
Among the challenges Michael is facing is that he has now violated his own code.
Michael and I worked together on his 2008 best-selling book and for sure we have long had a constructive relationship. We have not spoken this week. But I know him well enough to feel confident that no one feels worse about what happened than Michael.
I know, too, that he will deal with whatever is to come forthrightly. That is his way.
The issue is, what is appropriate?
Michael is a Baltimore guy through and through. He spent a few years in Ann Arbor, prepping for the 2008 Beijing Olympics while his longtime coach and mentor, Bob Bowman, was the head coach at the university. But now they are both back in Baltimore.
Michael is not — will never be — Hollywood. He is, for emphasis, a normal guy. He is happy to be in Baltimore, cheering on his Ravens like most everybody else there.
The deal is this, though: it may not be the best time to be a high-profile athlete facing the bar of justice in Baltimore, what with Ray Rice in the news. Under the law, Michael’s first DUI is irrelevant. At the same time, Michael has to accept that he might draw a judge who wants to make an example of him.
Beyond the legal ramifications, there is the matter of USA Swimming, indeed the Olympic establishment.
USA Swimming suspended him for three months for the 2009 episode. Now?
USA Today’s Christine Brennan suggested in a column Wednesday that Michael ought to be suspended for at least a year. She called his behavior “unconscionable.”
With due respect to my good friend Christine — she and I are from the same class at the Northwestern journalism school— her suggestion is over the top.
To compare:
The NFL suspended Donté Stallworth for a year after he pleaded guilty to DUI manslaughter charges in Florida. On March 14, 2009, in Miami, Stallworth killed a man while driving drunk.
To be clear, driving while impaired — again, Phelps is innocent until proven guilty — is bad no matter the circumstance.
In Stallworth’s case, for context, Stallworth’s blood-alcohol level was 0.126 and, of course, Mario Reyes, a construction worker who was simply trying to catch a bus home, is forever gone.
A prosecution video in the Stallworth case shows Stallworth braking immediately after Reyes ran into the street, outside the crosswalk — meaning, Stallworth has said, that even if sober he likely would have hit Reyes. But as Stallworth said in an interview this past summer, “.. I was wrong. I was driving under the influence and should not have been.”
Now, the argument is that Phelps should be gone for a year when no one -- luckily, true -- got hurt?
Things have to remain in proportion.
USA Swimming has said it’s assessing the situation.
It seems probable that Michael is going to be fined — other athletes are going to want to see that no one is above the rules, especially Michael — and suspended for some period of time. The issue is when and for how long. The 2015 world championships are next summer in Russia.
This leads to the crux of the matter, for all involved.
Michael has a boredom problem. The boredom problem creates a structure problem. The overarching problem is that there's a future problem.
It’s little wonder he is out presumably playing poker — which he enjoys — and, as he purportedly said to the police, having three or four drinks when he should have been in bed getting ready to swim.
Again, here is the deal:
Michael is the greatest of all time. He has 22 Olympic medals.
In Beijing, he went eight-for-eight. It was — incredible.
To do what he did in Beijing took years of monumental discipline, effort, focus and training. (Not to mention an awe-inspiring back-end split from Jason Lezak in the 400-meter freestyle relay.) Who wants to do that all over again? For sure not Michael.
This is the dilemma.
Michael knows that if he puts in the work that he can again be the world’s best swimmer — in certain races. But never again will he do what he did in Beijing. This is a terrible burden. For real. What must it be like to be great but never again as across-the-board great as you once were?
Michael talks about setting new goals. But swimming is the most relentlessly revealing of the Olympic sports. At the elite level, the sport is merciless in making clear whether an athlete has put in the work. You win -- or lose -- by hundredths of a second.
This is, in one fashion or another, what Michael has been wrestling with since the day the Beijing Games ended.
You saw it in 2011, at the world championships in Shanghai, where Ryan Lochte had put in the work, and Michael had not. In 2012, Michael tried the 400-meter individual medley, which he used to rule, and didn’t even medal — because he hadn’t trained sufficiently.
After the 400 IM, it became plain in London that Michael had done enough — just enough — to still star. But because he hadn’t really done everything he could have, he got out-touched by five-hundredths of a second in the 200 butterfly by Chad le Clos of South Africa — an ending that depended on feel in the water, feel that Phelps would have had, did have, in the 100 fly in Beijing, which he won by one-hundredth of a second over Serbia’s Milorad Cavic.
After London, Michael said, enough.
Then he watched the Americans come up short in the 400 free relay at the 2013 worlds in Barcelona and something stirred.
So he kinda-sorta came back.
Then, this year, he came back for real — and did very well at the Pan-Pacific championships in August in Australia, winning three gold medals and two silvers.
The good thing about the comeback is it gives Michael structure. He needs that sort of structure.
But obviously he's not yet all-in. On the road at 1:40 a.m.?
At the same time, and this must be said, this comeback is only prolonging the inevitable.
If Michael keeps swimming through 2016, it seems hugely unlikely that he would not make the U.S. team for Rio. Everyone says, like this is a bad thing, he’d be 31 by the start of those Games, in August, 2016. So what? He’s Michael. He's the best-ever. If he wants it, he will do it -- emphasis on the if.
Who, though, is Michael? Really, who is he? Not Michael the swimmer. Michael Phelps. At 29, who is he? And what is he all about?
Michael should take a good look at the guy looking back at him in the mirror and say, OK, what's the next chapter?
If he can do that, this DUI episode could — in a weird way — turn out to be a huge positive. Again, Michael should count his blessings that no one got hurt. He should not just count this as, but legitimately come to see this as, a second chance -- at everything.
He has it all, you say?
Not really. Michael doesn't know what he wants to do with himself.
When Michael was 16, he had the audacity to tell Peter Carlisle, who would go on to be his agent — still is his agent — that his goal was to grow the sport of swimming. He could see that already.
He hasn’t been able with the same clarity to articulate anything else. That’s where the drift has come. Now is the time to figure it out — especially if there is to be a suspension.
It seems reasonable to assume that, however this shakes out, Michael is going to find himself doing community service. And part of that service will involve speaking to kids. And those kids are going to ask, Michael, you always said it was OK to make a mistake but not to make it twice — what do you say now?
And if the other part of the code is learning from every mistake -- what are the lessons from this one?
Now is the time to figure all this out. Because that is a huge part of this next chapter. Of being accountable to himself and to everyone around him -- because he is normal, and yet in some respects his life is not normal and likely never will be. Of figuring out who Michael Phelps is, and what his next direction holds.
BARCELONA -- With Michael Phelps watching from the stands, the U.S. men took a lead into the final leg of the men's 4x100 relay here Sunday night at the Palau Sant Jordi. As the old building roared, what happened in the next 48 or so seconds was either a bad case of déjà two all over again or a matter of the Americans playing not for short-term glory but for long-term reward. Depends on your point of view.
Just like last year at the Olympic Games in London, the French ran the Americans down in the final 50 meters. Last year it was Yannick Agnel showing Ryan Lochte no mercy. This time, Jeremy Stravius showed Jimmy Feigen how it's done, the French winning in 3:11.18, the Americans 24-hundredths back.
Russia took third, another 20-hundredths behind. Vlad Morozov ripped off a 47.4 third leg but it was not enough.
"We wanted to win. What can I say?" Agnel -- who has been training in Baltimore this year with Phelps' longtime mentor, Bob Bowman -- said afterward.
Bowman, who is the U.S. men's coach here, said, "We could definitely do better. We are disappointed with that."
You think the U.S. men could have used, well, Phelps?
"Those four guys did an amazing job," Natalie Coughlin, the veteran U.S. racer said after the American women's 4x100 relay team won gold, buoyed by Megan Romano's thrilling anchor leg. Coughlin quickly added in a reference to the U.S. team overall but one that served as a punctuation to the men's relay, "Yeah, we miss Michael."
That's because Michael -- who was quite the presence Sunday in Barcelona, signing autographs, posing for photos, doing his thing as swim ambassador, his right foot in a walking boot -- understood fully that the 4x100 free relay traditionally has been an American priority, whether at the worlds and the Olympics, and that winning it is technically fairly simple to diagram if nonetheless difficult to execute.
The men's freestyle relay now has evolved to the point that it takes all four guys swimming in the 47-second range. If one guy rips off 46-something, all kinds of things are possible.
This is what Jason Lezak showed in Beijing in 2008 with his out-of-this-world 46.06 anchor leg, after Phelps himself opened up with a 47.51. Garrett Weber-Gale, swimming second, went 47.02; Cullen Jones, third, 47.65. The Americans won by eight-hundredths of a second over the French.
In 2009, at the world championships in Rome, Phelps led off in 47.78. Lochte went next, in 47.03. Matt Grevers followed in 47.61. Nathan Adrian closed in 46.79. The Americans won.
In 2011, at the worlds in Shanghai, Phelps led off -- in 48.08. Weber-Gale went next, in 48.33. Lezak went third, going 48.15. Adrian swam 47.64. The Americans took third, in 3:11.96. The Aussies put together four 47s, and won in 3:11 flat.
Last year at the Olympics, Adrian kicked things off in 47.89. Phelps went next, in 47.15. Jones, back in form, turned in a 47.6. Then Lochte went 47.74. Should have been good enough, right?
Except that Agnel went 46.74.
The French won in 3:09.93, the Americans taking silver in 3:10.38. Just like this year, the Russians took third.
The American line-up Sunday night was Adrian, Lochte, Anthony Ervin and Feigen.
Feigen swam in the prelims in the 4x100 relay in London, going 48.49. He also has pulled recent national-team duty at the world short-course championships -- that is, in a 25-meter pool -- with comparatively few fans in the stand.
This would be his first turn on the big stage.
In Sunday's prelims, Ervin went 47.38. Ricky Berens, a national-team veteran, rocked a 47.56. Like Feigen, Berens swam in the London prelims. Berens is a two-time gold medalist in the 4x200 relay.
Bowman and the other U.S. coaches opted to go with Feigen and, moreover, to put him in the anchor slot.
The French countered with Agnel, Florent Manaudou, Fabien Gilot and Stravius.
Manaudou won gold in the 50 free in London, in 21.34. Gilot went 47.67 in the London relay win. Stravius was the unknown -- having gone 48.32 in the London relay prelims. At a news conference a couple days ago, he had said he was "happy to be here."
Agnel turned in -- by his measure -- a sub-par 48.76; after his swim the French were seventh. Manaudou went 47.93, lifting them back up to fourth. Then Gilot ripped off a 46.9.
Meanwhile, Adrian went 47.95, Lochte 47.8, Ervin 47.44. It seemed the Americans were heading toward victory.
Stravius, though, went 47.59.
Feigen? 48.23.
Three Americans went 47, one went 48.23 and the U.S. lost by 24-hundredths. There, essentially, is your race.
To his credit, Feigen -- who absolutely is an up-and-comer -- was straight-up about it all afterward. He said Stravius "ended up wanting it more than I did, and that showed." He said, "I've got to learn to swim my own race," acknowledging his breathing pattern was slightly off as he came toward the final wall.
"You know what?" said Ervin, the 2000 Sydney Games 50 free gold medalist who is now 32 and has since seen a lot of life. "You can't win them all. When you can't win, what you get is experience."
"It's kind of a learning experience," Feigen said. "And hopefully, I can get better every time."
Which, Bowman said, is the point. If you're not going to win, there's Rio and 2016 to consider.
Asked if the Americans were missing Phelps Sunday night, he laughed and said, "We were on that relay, I think.
"You know, it's the way it goes. These guys are learning. We are trying to figure out where people should go, really, in 2016. We want to win all these. But, these guys, it's the first time in a new [quadrennium]. Everybody gets kind of a shot to see where they are."
Asked if the French were glad Phelps wasn't swimming, Agnel said, "I don't understand the question." Which he totally did, because he then smiled a very big smile.
Bowman added that Phelps had been texting critiques of the race from his perch in the stands.
"He was disappointed we got beat," Bowman said, adding a moment later, "He was just giving me his analysis of the race, things I could have done better." Which was? Another laugh. "I'll keep that to myself."
LONDON -- This is the end, so limitless and free, Jim Morrison sang, and so it came on this Saturday night for Michael Phelps, the one and only, the greatest athlete in Olympic history. In what he said repeatedly would be his last competitive swim, Phelps, 27, swam the butterfly leg of the men's 4x100 medley relay for the U.S. team on the final night of the swim meet at the 2012 Olympic Games, the Americans winning in 3:29.35.
The victory gave Phelps his 22nd Olympic medal, his 18th gold. He finished these Games with six medals -- four gold, two silver.
He became the first male swimmer to throw the Olympic three-peat, and did it in not just one event but two, the 200 IM and the 100 butterfly. The medley victory also made him the third person to win three golds in that event, along with Jason Lezak and Ian Crocker.
"I have been able," he said late Saturday in emphasizing he truly is retiring from racing, "to do everything I wanted."
Read the rest at NBCOlympics.com: http://bit.ly/PTGKLY
LONDON -- One of the enduring images of the 2008 Beijing Olympics is the primal scream that Michael Phelps uttered on the pool deck when Jason Lezak, seemingly seized by an out-of-body experience, delivered a swim for the ages. In overtaking France's Alain Bernard, Lezak -- who swam 100 meters in 46.06 seconds -- secured relay gold for the United States and, not so incidentally, kept alive Phelps' historic chase for eight gold medals.
That day in Beijing, Phelps threw his arms up toward the sky as if he were signaling a touchdown by his favorite team, the Baltimore Ravens. Garrett Weber-Gale, who had raced the second leg of that relay, grabbed Phelps from behind as if he were about to body-slam him to the deck, or punch him, or something. The French, just over to the side, looked on in stunned silence.
Revenge, you know, is so délicieux.
Read the rest at NBCOlympics.com: http://bit.ly/NPDAuR
LONDON - Not including the U.S.-boycotted 1980 Moscow Games, the American men's 4x100 relay team has won a medal in the event at every Olympics since the event debuted in 1964. There were seven straight golds, then a silver in 2000, a bronze in 2004 and then, thanks to Jason Lezak, maybe the best-ever gold in Beijing in 2008. The U.S. men face the most direct of challenges in 2012.
Not just to win.
But -- to medal.
Read the rest at NBCOlympics.com: http://bit.ly/P6wDTL
OMAHA -- Garrett Weber-Gale was back in the pool Thursday, swimming rounds of the 100 meter freestyle. Cullen Jones, too. And, of course, Jason Lezak. Michael Phelps was at it, too, in the 200 fly, winning his signature event in 1:53.65.
It was all enough to evoke memories of that electric moment in Beijing in 2008, when those four guys, and especially Lezak, summoned one of the most incredible performances in Olympic history, winning the 400-meter freestyle relay.
The huge challenge now awaiting the 2012 U.S. team is to bring back relay gold again. It took a miracle four years ago. Bluntly, and everyone involved with the U.S. swim community knows so, even if they won't say so publicly, it may take more in London.
Why? Because the Australians have gotten that good. The French are good, too. The Italians, Russians and South Africans have gotten way better.
And the Americans, who have tradition and pride and history on their side, all of that -- it's not clear who the Americans are going to put into that relay beyond Phelps and the current No. 1 American sprinter, Nathan Adrian.
The prelims and the semis of the 100 free Thursday, of course, aren't the finals, which go down Friday. But rest assured that after reading the times the leading Americans posted Thursday the Aussies probably weren't breaking into a cold sweat.
Adrian led the semis with a 48.33. Jimmy Feigin was next in 48.48. Matt Grevers, who won the 100 back the night before, came third in 48.71.
Weber-Gale? Seventh, in 48.98. Jones? Eighth, in 49.03.
Lezak finished ninth, in 49.05. That left him out of Friday night's final -- for all of about a moment. Ryan Lochte, who had finished in a tie for fifth, with Scot Robison, told Lezak on his way off the pool deck that he would be scratching out of the final, to concentrate on his Friday night double, the 200 IM and the 200 back.
So Lezak lives to fight on, at least for one more day.
Grevers, meanwhile, also scratched out of the 100 final, again to concentrate on the 200 back. That gave a spot in the 100 final to David Walters, who had finished 10th, in 49.34.
Again, the semi times are not likely to be the finals times. Even so, all involved well understand the complexity of the situation as it relates to the relay.
"We'll put together four good guys and hope for a Lezak-type swim," Bob Bowman, Phelps' coach, said with a smile.
The 2008 400 free relay was awesome and awe-inspiring and to watch it, no matter how many times you watch it, is an occasion for chills. Even if you're French.
To watch Lezak's anchor leg is to take in the power and potential of human will. Lezak swam 100 meters in an other-worldly 46.06 seconds, overtaking France's Alain Bernard at the very end, the Americans winning in world- and Olympic-record time, 3:08.24.
Phelps swam the lead-off leg on that relay. He won eight golds, of course, in Beijing. He went eight-for-eight in Beijing in measure because of Lezak.
If you want to know why, among other reasons, Phelps has consistently downplayed any eight-for-eight talk at the 2012 Olympics, it's best to understand how significantly the sprint scene has changed since four years ago in Beijing.
The Americans had won the 400 free relay at the 2005, 2007 and 2009 world championships -- Adrian bailing them out in Rome in 2009 with a stirring anchor leg -- and in Beijing in 2008.
Swimming can sometimes be an intensely technical sport. A breakdown here of the American Beijing relay splits:
Phelps swam his lead-off leg in 47.51 seconds. Weber-Gale followed in 47.02. Jones went next, in 47.65. Then Lezak, in 46.06.
At the 2011 world championships in Shanghai, the pre-race focus within the American camp was Eamon Sullivan, the Australian anchor. He had gone a then-world record 47.05 in Beijing, at the Games.
The Aussies' lead-off guy was James Magnussen. No one knew much about him except he was tall and 20 years old.
Everyone learned fast.
Magnussen went 47.49. Compare that to Phelps' Beijing lead-off leg.
Phelps, who was in decent but not tip-top shape in Shanghai, turned in an eminently solid 48.08. That put the Americans in second place.
The Americans never did lead in that race. In Shanghai, Weber-Gale swam second; Lezak, third; Adrian, anchor. The Americans dropped to third during the second leg; fourth with Lezak; Adrian pulled them back up to third at the finish.
Final standings: Australia, in 3:11 flat. France, 3:11:14. United States, 3:11.96.
Along with Magnussen, each of the four Aussies on that relay swam in the 47s: Matthew Targett, Matthew Abood, Sullivan.
The Austrialians are just flat-out loaded with sprinters. There's another Australian guy on the scene: James Roberts. At the Aussie Trials this past March, he swam a 47.63 in the 100.
Magnussen is a cool customer. Asked in Shanghai what it was like to swim against Phelps, he said, "No biggie."
Magnussen went on to become the first Australian in history win the open 100 at the worlds, going 47.63 in Shanghai.
Earlier this year, he swam a 47.10, fourth-fastest ever. The world record is 46.91, held by Brazil's Cesar Cielo. You can bet that Magnussen has his eyes on that record in London.
The French, meanwhile, have a young gun of their own, 20-year-old Yannick Agnel. In March, he swam a 48.02 open 100. Fabien Gilot typically anchors for the French; in Shanghai, he swam a 47.22 anchor leg.
Asked late Thursday how the U.S. team is likely to stack up against the world, Phelps said, "I mean, you can look at times but you'll never know until … we all get together. We look fairly decent; I think some of the things we'll probably have to work on and get ready for. I think the 400 free relay and the 400 medley relay are going to be very challenging events.
"But I think we'll be able to come together as a team. We always have. We have been able to do that very well, I guess, throughout my experience on the international level. I have no doubt we'll be able to come together and get behind one another and prepare ourselves the best we can to represent our country."
UPDATE, Friday 5 p.m. Central: USA Swimming, which on Thursday announced Grevers had scratched out of the 100 final, has posted a sign in the media workroom saying that's not so. He's in the final. Lochte is out. Grevers is in.
Ten years ago today, Ross Powers launched himself into the brilliant blue Utah sky. Ross first slid down into the frozen wall of the halfpipe and then rocketed right out of it, way above its icy lip and hung there, 40 feet up, maybe more. For perhaps a second, he was flying, literally flying, testing the pull of gravity, a black silhouette against the blue, emblematic of humankind's eternal push to be greater than anything that had come before.
It was, for a moment in time, perfect.
The Olympic Games are rich with moments and memories, and over the past few editions, Summer and Winter, there have been so, so many:
Jason Lezak's out-of-body final lap in the pool to save the 400-meter relay for the American team in Beijing. On the track, Usain Bolt's 100- and 200-meter runs at those same Olympics. Cathy Freeman's overwhelming 400 in Sydney.
To compare snowboarding to swimming or track and field is of course apples and oranges. Yet the essence of the Olympics is that instant where everything comes together to produce a transcendent moment, one of lasting memory.
"It's one of my favorite memories, too," Ross was saying the other day on the telephone, laughing, and as it turns out he was taking the call in Park City, Utah, where the 2002 snowboarding events were held. He's now director of snowboarding at the Stratton Mountain (Vt.) School, and was in Park City with a bunch of the school's kids.
Ross came to those 2002 Games as the 1998 Nagano Games halfpipe bronze medalist, among other accomplishments. He was one of a number of 2002 medal favorites.
The day before the 2002 halfpipe was his 23rd birthday. The morning of the event, as the crowd was starting to form at the bottom of the hill, he ran into his mom, Nancy, and his younger brother, Trevor. Ross said to them, just making conversation, "Hey, what are you guys doing tonight?"
Nancy replied, full of confidence, "I'm going to the medals ceremony!"
Ross recalls now, "I just kind of laughed."
The tension broken, Ross just went out there and ripped it. The pipe itself was huge and fast and everyone knew it. The U.S. Ski Team crew, along with the guys at Burton, had Ross' board waxed just so to maximize performance.
The trick that Ross performed to perfection is a basic maneuver in a snowboard pro's repertoire. It's called a method air or, alternatively,a method grab. It's the same trick in skateboarding -- after sailing off the pipe (or skateboard ramp), the rider reaches down his or her hand and grabs the edge of the board, between the feet. When it's done to form, it looks like you're kneeling in mid-air.
Even though it's relatively basic, the advantage of the method grab is that -- when you hit it -- it can produce amazing amplitude, which is snowboard talk for big air. What no one yet knew, until Ross threw it so spectacularly, is that starting with the 2002 Olympics big air was the way to go.
At the Nagano Games, because of the way the rules worked then, it really wasn't that way. In his moment in the sky, Ross forever changed the rules of the game. Shaun White and everyone else -- they would follow Ross.
He felt that morning like he was in on a big secret: "It feels good," he recalls thinking, "to have a big trick."
Especially one he was going to throw first. That would get the crowd into it, big-time.
"I dropped in," Ross recalled, "and let it flow along the right wall … and then went smooth through the flats and definitely did the biggest transition I ever did in the halfpipe," and up, up, up he went.
Most calculations are he went 18 to maybe even 22 feet off the lip of the pipe, at least 40 feet up. "It felt smooth and easy," he said, adding, "When I was in the air it just felt good. I was just confident and had the feeling, no question, I was going to land it."
He landed it, and followed with more complex tricks, ones involving the sorts of gymnastically oriented spins and rotations that are part of the snowboarding landscape.
About three-quarters of the way through the run, he remembers thinking, this could well be a gold-medal run -- don't blow it: "You gotta land, you're almost to the bottom, you have a good run, just keep going and finish."
He did.
The judges gave him a score of 46.1, way ahead of the rest of the field.
Two other Americans rounded out the medals: Danny Kass took second, 3.6 points back of Ross, and J.J. Thomas third.
The 1-2-3 sweep was the first time Americans had swept the medals in an event since 1956. That had been in men's figure skating.
The day before, American Kelly Clark had won gold in the women's halfpipe.
The U.S. team's performance in the halfpipe in 2002 is largely credited with pushing snowboarding from the fringe to the mainstream.
Ross remembers being with Kelly at the Daytona 500, just days later. "These elderly women were meeting us and saying, 'You guys are great! Snowboarding is so great! I want to get my grandkids on those boards!' It was huge for snowboarding."
Beyond his work for the Stratton school, Ross remains actively involved in promoting his own foundation, which he launched in 2001, the year before the Salt Lake Games, to help athletes with the talent but not the support they might need.
Meanwhile, an extension of the Ross Powers Foundation, the Level Field Fund -- launched about 18 months ago -- provides grants covering everything from instruction to entry fees to travel. Michael Phelps, Daron Rahlves and Seth Wescott have helped out; the fund has already awarded more than $220,000 to more than 50 athletes in sports such as snowboarding, swimming, skiing, judo and skeleton racing.
Ross and his wife, Marisa, are by now the parents of two little girls. Meredith is 4. On her snowboard, she is good on heel edges already and, Ross said, "That's really cool to see." Victoria is 8 and, as it turns out, spent the 10th anniversary of her dad's victory out on Bromley Mountain in Vermont -- where Ross himself learned to ride -- racing in her very first boardercross event. Guess who won?
Perfect.
