Swimming

Olympics are about hopes and dreams. Second to last in men's 100 breast. And grateful

Olympics are about hopes and dreams. Second to last in men's 100 breast. And grateful

PARIS – Swim competition at these Paris 2024 Games got underway at 11:02 Saturday morning. By 11:38, Micah Masei, representing America Samoa, was done, his Olympics over just that quickly, 34th of 35 in the men’s 100-meter breaststroke, second to last.

Masei knew coming in that this, or something very much like this, would be the drill.

Which, in the case of Micah Masei and literally thousands of others of those taking part in these Paris Games, is absolutely the fundamental truth.

Because for most here the Olympics are not about winning.

The Olympics are about hopes and dreams.

Most swimmers do not take part in the opening ceremony. He did. Through the pouring rain. To take part in what International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach declared to the assembled athletes would be the “pinnacle of [their] Olympic journey.”

When four years for an anti-doping rule violation is correct but not -- right

When four years for an anti-doping rule violation is correct but not -- right

U.S. swimmer Kensey McMahon just got four years for an anti-doping rule violation, and it’s not right.

To be clear, under the rules, the four-year ban she got is – correct.

But there can be a difference between correct, and right, and this is one of those times, and perhaps the case of Kensey McMahon can, maybe sooner than later, effect a course correction in the anti-doping rules because this matter underscores the disconnect between the rules as they’re supposed to be and the way they work, when applied, as written, with no wiggle room, in real life.

The 800 free, and how good can best-ever Katie Ledecky be? Still trying to be better

BUDAPEST — Sports is perhaps the last refuge of unscripted reality shows, so it would be rude and disrespectful to declare that Katie Ledecky had the women’s 800 freestyle won before the beep went off Friday night here at the 19th FINA world championships.

But, you know, come on.

If we’re being honest, a legit contender for the best show in sports is to see how good Katie Ledecky can be. Still. Ten years after she burst onto the scene, winning the 800 free as a 15-year-old at the London Games in 2012.

“I made it a goal to not be a one-hit-wonder, and here we are,” she said.

Halfway through Budapest 2022: Dressel goes home and other murmurs

Halfway through Budapest 2022: Dressel goes home and other murmurs

BUDAPEST — As Yogi Berra once famously said, it ain’t over til it’s over, and while the swimming part of these 19th FINA championships is just now half over, and for a great chunk of the world these championships perhaps have an are-they-really-happening vibe, up close there are threads that clearly deserve pulling:

— Caeleb Dressel, the top American guy, went home abruptly. USA Swimming wouldn’t say what’s wrong, citing medical privacy laws.

Let’s deconstruct.

Count to 14. One Mississippi, two ... that's how much Katie Ledecky won by

Count to 14. One Mississippi, two ... that's how much Katie Ledecky won by

BUDAPEST — Some cars go from zero to 60 really fast. Not a 1975 AMC Pacer. It requires a touch over 14 seconds.

Got the picture in your mind of that wide-as-it-as-long, weirdo-bubble-glass, frog-like thing belching, lumbering, wheezing toward 60? Take out your cellphone, go to the stopwatch function, click start and watch it go tick, tick, tick. And keep on ticking. One Mississippi, two …

Fourteen-plus is a lot of seconds. Usain Bolt is already in the midst of a second 100-meter dash.

In the women’s 1500 freestyle at these 2022 FINA world championships, 14-plus is how much time winner Katie Ledecky put between her and runner-up Katie Grimes, a 16-year-old from Las Vegas.

Hey, Tilly — Katie won … again!

Hey, Tilly — Katie won … again!

BUDAPEST — If you need to read about golfers yelling at each other or journalists yelling at golfers or something like that, please click elsewhere.

Katie Ledecky was back racing Saturday night, which means we can all feel good about, well, everything. Especially about the notion of endless possibilities. And what it means to genuinely be an inspiration seemingly everywhere in our fractious and chaotic world, and especially to women and girls — some of whom make posters for you and still others who make posters and then grow up to, you know, race you.

Gunnar Bentz quietly gets to put Rio, and all that, behind him

Gunnar Bentz quietly gets to put Rio, and all that, behind him

TOKYO — If redemption is the most American of stories, then Gunnar Bentz — five years later — gets his chance here at the Tokyo 2020 Games.

It was nearly five years ago that Bentz and three other U.S. swimmers were involved in what came to be widely known as Lochtegate, the infamous episode at the gas station at the Rio 2016 Olympics.

None of the other three are on the Tokyo team.

At FINA, generational change -- even (wow), it's 2021, personal emails!

At FINA, generational change -- even (wow), it's 2021, personal emails!

Since this is 2021, you probably have an email address. That email address is almost surely your name @ gmail or Yahoo or Outlook. Or it’s some super-cute thing, or it’s a combo of your name and numbers, like MP8for8Beijing or Usain958yams, again at gmail or Yahoo or Outlook. Like that. Right?

Not to say that things were maybe in need of an update at FINA, the international sports federation that oversees swimming and five other water-related disciplines, four of them Olympic sports (water polo, diving, artistic swimming and open water — the federation is pushing hard for the fifth, high dive), but literally no one at FINA had her or his own individual email. No one.

For years and years, emails went to departments. Not to people. That’s — how it was.

So, back to the 2021 thing. FINA now has, after 35 years, a new executive director, Brent Nowicki, an American lawyer, who succeeds Cornel Marculescu.

One of the first — of many — changes: FINA staff will get their own email addresses.

It’s no small thing.

After four editions of the swim Trials: a love letter to Omaha

After four editions of the swim Trials: a love letter to Omaha

OMAHA, Neb. — It was 106 degrees here Thursday. Not the kind of day that makes you long for Omaha.

But I’m gonna miss it here.

Rumor is, and only rumor, that this may well be the final time the U.S. swim Trials are held in Omaha. They’ve been here four times in a row: 2008, 2012, 2016 and now 2021. Indianapolis wants 2024 and, to be honest, it kind of feels like a change of pace might well be in order, that the big field house that is Lucas Oil Stadium might well be next.

If that is the case, Omaha has had a great run -- inside the basketball arena, now called CHI Health Center, just up the street from the baseball field, TDAmeritrade Park, home of the NCAA men’s College World Series, which this year gets underway Saturday.