We’re Talking ‘Bout Prelims Relays? Did Extra Swims Cost US Individual Medals?

There has been a lot of talk in the last decade about American coaches’ questionable relay decisions, like the choices in the mixed medley in Tokyo that seemed to defy custom, math, and circumstance.

But sometimes the conversations about prelims lineups can be just as heated. There are typically two focuses of prelims relays that coaches would discuss publicly.

One, and the most important, is qualifying for finals. The questionable inclusion of Anthony Ervin by his coach Dave Durden at the 2015 World Championships led to an 11th-place American finish in the heats and no finals swim.

The other is an opportunity in free relays especially to test swimmers’ form ahead of the medal finals. Seeing where your relay-only swimmers are at before you throw them under the spotlights is a valuable tool for coaches, and part of why USA Swimming probably stopped allowing replacements for scratches like Katie Ledecky in the 200 free.

It would be rare for a country as deep as America to use this in the medleys, though.

There’s one more purpose of prelims relays, especially for the United States, and it’s one that would never be stated out loud: to rack up more medals.

In swimming, for a certain subset of fans, it is taboo to discuss the quality of one medal versus another medal. Since 1984, a prelims relay gold medal goes in the tables just the same as an individual gold medal, though when we begin discussing “greatness” rankings, we’re all happy to suddenly parse that difference.

Of all the things that USA Swimming does for its Olympic athletes financially, the ability to accrue the most gold medals via relay lineups might be the most valuable thing they do. While the calculations would be near-impossible to determine how much in lifetime earnings an Olympic gold medal is worth to an athlete in sponsorships, increased clinic fees, and professional opportunities both inside of swimming and outside of swimming, it is almost definitely more than the $37,500 that the USOPC pays them directly for that medal (though that’s real money too).

Questionable Decisions in This Week’s Prelims Relays?

There have been really four prelims relay decisions this week in Paris for American coaches that have raised eyebrows, and all three of those relate to swimmers who train under the Olympic Teams’ head coaches – who have the final say in relay lineups.

One of these, giving Kieran Smith a free pass into finals of the 800 free relay after not having a great swim in the 400 free, has proven to be clairvoyant: his 1:44.80 split was the best by the Americans in the final of the 800 free relay where they took silver.

The other three, though, really don’t directly impact the United States’ relay success, but have brought questions about whether they might have impacted the United States’ individual medal tallies.

On Friday, US coaches used Regan Smith in the heats of the mixed medley relay. Presumably, that was on the premise of getting every Olympic Trials winner into that relay, which is possible using heats and finals.

The challenge was that Smith had a final that evening in the 200 backstroke. There she had an anticipated tight battle with her international rival Kaylee McKeown. After Smith led most of the race, McKeown pulled past her in the final 50 to win by about half-a-second. Smith’s last 50 wasn’t bad, but McKeown’s last 50 is the best in the world (though by her own standards, this wasn’t her best final 50).

In the same relay, the Americans used Caeleb Dressel on the butterfly leg. He trains under US head coach Anthony Nesty, as the anchor leg (instead of one of the two men who finished top two in the 100 free at Trials).

Dressel won’t swim that relay in finals, but even without him, that is possibly the event that will put him into a tie with Mark Spitz at 9 gold medals, the second-most in swimming history behind Michael Phelps.

He then had the 50 free finals and the 100 fly semifinals later in the session. He was 6th in the 50 free in 21.61 and missed the finals in the 100 fly, placing 13th in the 100 fly in 51.57.

Then on Saturday morning, American coaches used Kate Douglass in heats of the women’s 400 medley relay. While Douglass could have easily been in the finals relay in a certain configuration, her inclusion in heats indicates that she likely won’t be, where the Americans are favored to win gold as well.

She has the 200 IM final on Saturday evening, where she will race against one of the deepest fields in Olympic history where there are six legitimate gold medal contenders, including Kaylee McKeown and Summer McIntosh, two of the true stars of this meet so far.

In all three of those cases, athletes had to get up earlier than they would have otherwise to prepare for their prelims swims, do an extra warmup, an extra race, an extra cooldown, and extra bus ride, extra time out in the heat. With an immense amount of conversation about how difficult it has been for athletes to get adequate rest this week in the conditions of the Athlete Village (we don’t know where any of these athletes are staying), that’s rest that might have made a difference. We’ll never know, but it makes sense that these things might have made a difference.

In two of those cases, the US had viable choices to replace the star swimmers in question. Katharine Berkoff is swimming very well and is otherwise done competing and could have been used in heats of the mixed medley. Thomas Heilman missed the semis of the 100 fly, but his 51.82 in heats would have still been good enough for the US to get a middle-ish lane for finals – though Dressel’s 50.10 split was a good time for him.

There probably wasn’t a great replacement for Douglass on the women’s 400 medley relay that wouldn’t have shifted the burden onto Torri Huske or Gretchen Walsh, who the US needs for the finals relay. Simone Manuel could have gotten them through to finals with her 52.61 split from the 400 free relay earlier in the meet, though after missing the semis in the 50, her form a week into her meet is unclear.

It is not likely that any of these athletes were required to swim those heats, but athletes aren’t known for declining medal opportunities, even when maybe they should, especially at the Olympics. That’s one of many reasons that coaches exist, to help athletes regulate their load management.

We’ll never know who would have done what without these extra swims, but the questions make enough sense that we will all continue to wonder about the choices. The concepts really highlight the complicated duality of Olympic swimming as an individual sport with strong team elements, especially in major swimming nations like the United States.