For the first time since the 2012 Olympic Trials, Katie Hoff has returned to competition this weekend at the Speedo Winter Championships meet in Plantation, Florida.
In yards competition, against largely high school aged competition (albeit some very good high school aged swimmers), Hoff won the 200 yard freestyle on Saturday in 1:45.93.
Having been so focused on international competition for so long, there’s not much good context for where that swim sits, but it is clearly a good enough time that Hoff is in good shape and swimming well. She said early last year that she was taking a break to focus on studying, but refused to declare it a retirement.
The 24-year old Hoff, an 8-time World Champion (7 long course, 1 short course) and three-time Olympic medalist, is also scheduled to swim the 200 IM and 100 free on Sunday.
Among other strong swims so far at this meet, which began Thursday and runs through Sunday, was a 1:38.47 from Joshua Romany, who swam at the Junior World Championships.
Michigan-bound Clara Smiddy, who was the runner-up behind Hoff in that 200 free, won the girls’ 200 back in 1:55.07 on Friday. That’s her lifetime best by almost two seconds, and moves her to a tie for 38th in the event on the all-time 17-18 National Age Group Rankings. She also won the 50 free in 23.51.
Katie, welcome back to the sport! Here’s to hoping that this chapter of your life is on your own terms, and not something that fans or coaches put on you. We love to watch you swim fast, but we love to watch you enjoy the sport even more.
Welcome back!
LOVE this comment 🙂 Completely agree! Welcome back Katie!!
Good for Katie.
As I understand it, T2 has a rather unconventional training style (low yardage, emphasis on technique). I hope it keeps working for Katie, who seems like she struggled to find a good training environment for the last five years. After 2008, there was a bit of coaching turnover at NBAC, and a brief stint with FAST that sort of fell apart.
Good luck to her the rest of this season and onward. She could be another asset on what is already a dominant 4×200 for the American women.
random question on katie hoff. is she featured in a tv comercial for some sort of facial product? i was at a bar last night and during a comercial break on sports center i thought the lady in the comercial looked a lot like katie hoff.
on another note, i love swimmer/celebrity look-a-likes, and so i scour the internet looking images to match up. katie hoff’s CLAL is alanis morisette. check it out for yourself if you want to have you mind blown.
anyway, glad to see her back in competition. at the same meets as her for several years in virginia and then coached at meets where she swam in maryland. i once saw her set several american records… Read more »
I think that’s a little harsh to call out names regarding the suits. We have no idea who benefitted from the suits most. Coventry was already an Olympic Champion in ’04 (with a bronze in the 2IM) while both Rice and Adlington were hitting the prime of their careers in ’08. Personally, I’m convinced we would have seen a LOT more from Rice in terms of major medals had it not been for persistent shoulder injuries that kept her from training. I think the suits masked a lot of improvements that swimmers had made going into an Olympic year.
Anyway. DE…lighted to see Hoff back. I hope over and above everything else that she is enjoying it!
Definitely could be. It’s easy to look at Alain Bernard and Eamon Sullivan and say that they benefitted a ton just from the suits because they came in and won by surprise.
Isn’t that what Kromowidjojo did in 2012? Bronze and silver to double gold and textile WR? Agnel and Florent weren’t exactly champs in 2011 either but they came through in the Olympic year
I’m not going to say none of it was from the suits helping some people more than others but yes, you can’t blame it all on the suits
I don’t think Kromowidjojo was a surprise in 2012. She won against a relatively weak field, and she was destined to be the ‘next great superstar in sprinting’ but was derailed a bit when she got viral meningitis in 2010.
Agnel had the same illness problems in 2011, though not quite to as scary of an extent as Kromowidjojo.
Sullivan was 2007 world champion(tied with Hayden).The only name you mentioned who was a big surprise was Florent because he made a 0.8s drop in a year.
Kromobot was in the making a long,long time ago.No surprise there.
Oh no DDIAS! 2007 World Champion was Filippo Magnini (of course tied with Brent Hayden)
PAOLO,
My bad, You are TOTALLY RIGHT!I exchanged in my mind Sullivan for Magnini, when he was Bronze.I remember that champs…Cielo got fourth place and didnt react well and that messed his chances in 50free.
More here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swimming_at_the_2007_World_Aquatics_Championships
Still, a bronze in WC dont make him(Sullivan) a dud.
Some American records are still held by Katie Hoff.
Big work to do for another Katie in the next months and years! 🙂
500 free. 4.30.47 in 2007
It should fall very quickly.
1000 free. 9.10.77 in 2007
Perhaps the most impressive. Good luck Miss Ledecky!
1650 free. 15.24.35 in 2008
It should fall the next time Miss Ledecky will swim it enough rested.
400 free short course. 3.57.07 in 2010
It will be broken next month at Duel in the Pool.
While I revisit her career, it makes me still more hate the new suits appeared in 2008. It looks like it has killed her olympic dreams the same year. Exactly like Laure Manaudou. Both swimmers were dominant in 2007 and the year after, because of new suits, new names come, destroy their best times and even world records. It was very hard for Miss Hoff and Miss Manaudou to accept that. They were well ahead of everyone in 2007 and a few months later some girls like Rice, Coventry or Adlington beat them. The new suits haven’t had the same effect on everyone and it’s clear that Katie and Laure haven’t benefited from them like some other swimmers. I hate… Read more »
Other great victims were Filippo Magnini and Kate Ziegler imho
To be fair to Adlington, she was clearly not the flash in the pan swimmer your post implies. Her personal best textile time is 4.02.3, that is the same as Hoff’s time from the ’08 US trials, while Hoff was wearing a ‘super-suit’. I think it is also just as fast as Manaudou ever managed to swum, although I haven’t checked up on that. I can’t speak in regards to Rice, although I feel she is/was a supremely talented IM’er (More so than Hoff for me personally). Coventry, 2004 Olympic medallist, be fair to the woman, she had a brilliant CAREER, not defined by the super-suits.
Love that dream team…. But what about Megan Romano??? She’s the relay queen!! And Shannon vreeland can certainly hold her own. I guess we’re just spoiled with such talented swimmers… But it’s definitely too hard to pick…
Megan is now a sprinter.
In her honor, here are a few great moments of her career.
400 IM at the olympic trials in 2004
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bIAc0mLFuY
400 IM world title and world record in 2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMc4xyJxsFc
500 free American record in 2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6vZab1dKMU
1650 free American record in 2008 (part 1)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HEEmEVGih4
1650 free American record in 2008 (part 2)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIWvsXRVi-Q
400 IM world record at the olympic trials in 2008
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycg_Ivs-Ej8
400 free short course world title in 2010 (her last world individual gold medal)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajYqX2svTAk