Sun Yang has, for now at least, confirmed to Chinese Swimming’s powers-that-be that even after the fame and riches (and new girlfriend) that came with his Olympic success, he has not lost much in the water.
He was among the first winners on day 1 of the 2013 Chinese Long Course National Championships (spring edition) with a 3:42.93. As the first of the big national championship/trials meets, that will be established early as easily the best time in the world; Hao Yun, the runner-up in 3:45.91, will go to 2nd on the world-wide list, and Li Yunqi in 3rd (3:47.15) now ranks 5th. That shows some improvement for Yunqi, though the top three placing order is an exact repeat of a year prior.
That time for Yang is almost exactly what he went at this same meet in 2012; about six-tenths slower, but with little competition that’s hardly a significant addition. Yang is the defending Olympic gold medalist in this 400 and the longer 1500 (which he’ll swim later in this meet).
In the women’s equivalent of the same race, Shao Yiwen won in 4:06.15, which ranks 2nd in the World behind only New Zealand’s Lauren Boyle. That too is about where she was at this meet last year, though the 18-year old will try to this time avoid a similar summer swoon to the one she saw in London that left her only 14th at the Olympics and out of the final.
The only other finals were the 400 free relays, where Lianing won the women’s race in an impressive domestic 3:39.70, and the Beijing men won in 3:17.92.
There were some semi-finals on the first day of this meet, which should set up for impressive finals swims on Tuesday. Shiwen Ye, Olympic champion, swam a 2:10.76 in the 200 IM. That’s not even her best time of the year yet, but a good result for a semi-final with nobody pushing her (only Siobhan-Marie O’Connor has been better than that time this year.)
In the women’s 100 fly semifinals, always among the most competitive races, Lu Ying took the top seed in 58.35, followed by Jiao Liuyang in 58.55 and Liu Zige in 58.74. Ying and Liuyang were the two Olympic representatives in this race last year, while Zige focused on the 200 where she was the defending champion (but only finished a disappointing 8th).
This meet is a direct selector for the prominent Chinese National Games that will be held later this year, but will also be weighed heavily in the selection process for the World Championships in Barcelona in July. China has a less traditional qualifying structure than the United States does; there’s no one method used to decide their rosters.
I tthink Thorpe’s 3:40.08 has broken VDH’s 100 WR as the longest standing men’s freestyle WR ever.
It’s amazing that after 11 years, Thorpe’s 400 free textile WR still stands.
I hope Yang breaks it this year, and especially to erase Biedermann’s rubber WR
Well, Thorpe was on body suit and ‘seal-like’ effect to reduce drag effect and take quite an effort to wear and remove. This high tech textile suit wore by Thorpe later progressed to full techno-syn-suit!! Without full body textile suit, I believe Thorpe time won’t so close to Biedermann’s rubberised world record.
Your may have only started to watch swimming in the past few years.
Facts:
1. Thorpe was the last person to break WR in BRIEFS (and not only one, but several).
2. At the age of 16 (that is, SIXTEEN years old) in 1999, Thorpe broke WRs and swam 1:46s, 1:45s and 3:42s, 3:41s in TEXTILE BRIEFS.
And you are claiming Thorpe was only able to swim 3:40 when he was at the peak age of 20 just because he wore textile bodysuit?
You are a hater. full stop.
Also, if Thrope’s bodysuit (with full armsleeves) had been that helpful, then why NOT ONE SINGLE SWIMMER wore full-body suit (with armsleeves) during the free-for-all rubber era of… Read more »
Surely, Thorpe has tried out his ‘freak’ outfit before any swimming majors during his training and training. And it reduced his timing in his pet events, there was an instance which was kind of embarrassment when he got into difficulty in putting on his outfit during one of the major competition!! Anyway, he was talented in his events during his era!!
What the hell are you talking about?
This statement ” he was talented in his events during his era!!” is evidence of your hatred.
Surely every swimming greats is talented in their events during their era? From The duke to Spitz to Popov to Thorpe to Phelps, they were all talented in their events during their era!
I have exposed your lack of knowledge by presenting the facts about and all you can respond is that?
Carry on with your hatred.
Sun returned to training just a few weeks ago… not tapered at all I would bet..
Well either way a 3:42.93 is an amazing swim especially if he is not tapered. I see him going sub 3:40 at Barcelona.
Xu Danlu is not swimming the meet?
And Sun Yang.. Hope for a sub 3:40 this year
Is sun tapered for this meet?
Xu is second in 400 free with a 4’09 ish time.
Gotta think he can go sub 4 with what he did at the olympics, BUT will he. Because the 400 is the first day and the 1500 is the last day, maybe he won’t be fully rested for the 400 cause he can’t hold a taper that long so he might not drop an amazing time until the 1500. Could he taper for the 400, build up a little then re-taper for the mile?
Well.. If he aims only for the WR on 400 he can get that and still will the 1500 on an average time.. 14:34 14:35…..