Men’s 200 free Final – Medal Race
Ryan Lochte finally turned on, for the first time this meet, and the result was spectacular. He flew through the 3rd turn in the men’s 200 free, and nobody could hang with him on the home stretch as he powered to the wall in 1:44.44.
His countrymate Michael Phelps led much of the race, but at the finish was lucky to hold off Paul Biedermann for 3rd. Phelps touched 2nd in 1:44.79, and Biedermann took 3rd in 1:44. Phelps actually closed the race better than Lochte, but it was that 3rd 50 that he’s had trouble with throughout the roudns of this race that got him. This is the first time in a World Championship or Olympic that Lochte has bettered Phelps, which marks a significant turning-point in his career. We’ve been hearing for about 12 months that Lochte is the new best swimmer in the world, but this race just about makes it official.
For Biedermann, this should just about put the final nail in the coffin that he’s not just a “suit swimmer”.
This was exactly the opposite podium result from what we saw two years ago in Rome.
Tae Hwan Park, who won the men’s 400, was trying to real in Biedermann, but came in just short at 1:44.92. Behind him was Yannick Agnel (1:44.99). Nikita Lobintsev, who was in medal position for the first half of the race, slipped to 5th in 1:46.57, followed by Dominik Meichtry and Danila Izotov.
Womens 100 backstroke final – Medal Race
Natalie Coughlin looked primed for World Championship number three in this 100 backstroke. Using her world-famous start, she led every stroke of this race, except for the last one. At the very last touch, she was beaten out by both China’s Zhao Jing (59.05) and Anastasia Zueva of Russia (59.06). Perhaps Coughlin’s lack of racing this year cost her at the finish, as that’s something that’s very difficult to do in practice?
Whatever the reason, Coughlin was still impessive to take the podium for the bronze in 59.15. That marks by two tenths the fastest she’s ever been in textile.
For Zhao Jing, this swim brings to fruition a ton of minor-championship potential over the last two years. She was the first female under 59 seconds in textile in 2010, and capped that off with a short course World Championship, but many still doubted her. Whereas Coughlin had this race won until the final stroke, Zhao wasn’t really in this race until the final stroke, and a great lunge won it for her.
Zueva’s swim is quite encouraging for the Russian medley relay, and her breaststroker Yuliya Efimova will come up later with a chance to further that group’s chances.
Australia’s Emily Seebohm took a valiant 4th place finish in 59.21, which is as good of a result as anyone could have hoped for coming into this meet after all of her health problems. Canada’s Sinead Russell, who twice broke the Canadian Record in this meet, just ran out of gas here to finish as the only swimmer above a minute in 1:00.20, but her quality throughout the first two rounds shouldn’t be ignored. If that 18-year old can shape up her build-by-round by London, she’s dangerous.
Full Women’s 100 back results.
Men’s 50 breaststroke semifinal
Though both have done well to improve their 100’s, both Cameron van der Burgh of South Africa and Felipe Silva of Brazil are, at their cores, 50 breaststrokers. Both showed it today to blow away the old textile best, with van der Burgh taking the top seed in the semifinal in 26.90 and Silva following him through in the 2nd heat at 26.95. The old mark was held by van der Burgh and Olig Lisogor of the Ukraine in 27.18.
Van der Burgh’s World Record of 26.67 is still going to be very difficult to get.
100m champion Alexander Dale Oen (27.33) and Italian 100 silver medalist Fabio Scozzoli (27.37) will take the 3rd and 4th seeds into the final. Damir Dugonjic, Hendrik Feldwehr, and Mark Gangloff made the final as well. Glenn Snyders from New Zealand (9th) and Brenton Rickard (13th) missed the final.
Full men’s 50 breaststroke semifinal results.
Women’s 1500 freestyle final – Medal Race
After prelims, this shaped up to be a highly competitive, strategic race. Apparently, Denmark’s Lotte Friis didn’t get that message, and she pushed the pace very hard from early and swam about the first half of the race under World Record pace to put 5 seconds between her and the field from very early on. Several times throughout the final 800 meters or so, the USA’s Kate Ziegler (who holds that World Record) tried to make a run at her, but Ziegler couldn’t hold her attack for more than about 75 meters befor Friis would fight away again. Friis swam effectively alone for most of this race with a big win in 15:49.59. Ziegler took the silver in 15:55.60.
For Friis, this is her 2nd-straight World Championships with a gold medal, and only the women’s second total gold medalin pool swimming (after her 800 win in Rome). She really has become a sporting torchbearer for her country. That swim has to make her the favorite in the 800. This is also the 4th-best swim in the history of the event, suited or not (behind a swim by herself, Italy’s Alessia Filippi’s winning time from 2009, and Ziegler’s World Record).
In the fight for the bronze, 1500m specialist Kristel Kobrich of Chile looked very strong through 1400 meters, but China’s Xuanxu Li executed a very hard finish, which has started to become a bit of a trademark for this Chinese team, to pull ahead for 3rd in 15:58.02. She made up a full 3 seconds on the final 50 alone, and about 4 total over the last lap. That takes back from Yiwen Shao the Chinese National Record, set in prelims, by four seconds. Shao, the second seed after prelims, didn’t have enough to come back fast again in this final, and finished 8th in 16:12.
Men’s 100 backstroke final – Medal Race
The French men have been having a great meet so far, and this 100 backstroke couldn’t have gone any better for them. Between Jeremy Stravius and Camille Lacourt, France seemed destined to come home with a gold. But not wanting to choose which swimmer would be the recipient of that gold, Stravius and Lacourt decided that they’d go ahead and tie at 52.76.
This is actually the second gold-medal tie in the history of the World Championships in swimming, and the first between teammates. It has happened twice (officially) at the Olympics, in 1984, when Americans Nancy Hogshead and Carrie Steinseifer tied for gold in the women’s 100 free; and in 2000 when American’s Anthony Ervin and Gary Hall Jr. tied for the 50 free gold. In 2007, Italy’s Filippo Magnini and Canada’s Brent Hayden tied in the men’s 100 free at the World Championships as well. It’s ironic that three of the four biggest ties in swimming history were between teammates, where there’s no better way to do it. What a great finish for the French, despite neither approaching Aaron Peirsol’s World Record that Lacourt, at the least, appeared poised to challenge.
(Note: Under current rules, the men’s 100 free would’ve been a tie at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, but officials there decided to award the title to John Devitt of Australia by over American Lance Larson based on their eyes, even though all three of Larson’s timers were faster than all three of Devitt’s. In 1972, there would have been another tie, that one in the 400 IM, but officials awarded Gunnar Larsson of Sweden the gold over Tim McKee of the USA by .002 seconds, which prompted the changing of the rule to make .01 the official measure.)
Besides being historical because of the tie, this also represented France’s first and second male titles in the 28-year history of the FINA World Championships, which is a fact that’s almost impossible to believe.
In 3rd was Japan’s Ryosuke Irie, who gets better as the races get longer, in 52.98. He was the fastest closing-50 in the field, which bodes well as he challenges Tyler Clary and Ryan Lochte in the 200 backstroke that begins Thursday. In 4th and 5th was a very tight battle between the Americans Nick Thoman and David Plummer. Plummer has bested Thoman in each of the first two rounds, but Thoman is much less aggressive in earlier rounds. Thoman led through about 30 meters (he’s great in short course, so no surprise there), Plummer took the lead at the turn, but at the touch Thoman took 4th in 53.01 ahead of Plummer’s 53.04.
This leaves a very tough call for the coaches on the American medley relay as to who goes to the prelim, and who goes to the final. They could easily just throw their hands up and say “Thoman took the individual, he gets the final,” but a strong argument could be made in favor of Plummer’s consistency for a relay final. Can’t wait to see what choice they make there.
Full men’s 100 backstroke results here.
Women’s 200 free semifinal
The USA’s Allison Schmitt got off of the blocks very slowly in her semifinal, which can spell trouble for a swimmer who relies on her front-half to carry her to championships. She was really taken out of her comfort zone and had to swim much harder on the final 50 than she might have liked just to make the final. As it was, she’s the 8th qualifier in 1:57.07, though she was about half-a-second clear of 9th-place finisher Agnes Mutina of Hungary. Mutina was probably the biggest disappointment not to final, as she looked very good in prelims.
The top seed was the Netherlands’ Femke Heemskerk, who will look for a gold in both this 200 and the 100 later in the meet, in 1:55.54 – the best time in the world this year. Federica Pellegrini still waited until the last 50 to get into the race, though we know she can go harder for longer than that, to take the 2nd seed in 1:56.42. Kylie Palmer of Australia, the world’s best time coming into this race, bettered that mark at 1:56.59. Camille Muffatt (France – 1:56.62), Sarah Sjostrom (Sweden – 1:56.71), and Bronte Barratt (Australia – 1:56.90) were all tightly grouped in the semi under 1:57.
The finalists will finish up with Germany’s Silke Lippok, and the aforementioned Allison Schmitt. This is a bit unfortunate for Schmitt, because Silke Lippok is almost guaranteed to take this race out harder than anybody else, and she would serve as a great rabbit for Schmitt if the pair was closer in the final, but as it is they’re on opposite ends of the pool.
Full results of the women’s 200 free semifinal.
Men’s 200 fly semifinal
Japan’s Takeshi Matsuda told us before the meet that he dropped every other race he had been working on (he was a likely finalist in the middle-distance free as well), and it appears to be paying off for him so far. He was the fastest swimmer in the world in 2010 in this race, and with this swim reconfirms that status in 2011 as well, as he’s now got the two best times in the world this year.
Michael Phelps, meanwhile, certainly looked much better than he has so far in this meet to take the 3rd seed in 1:54.85 on his second swim of the session. He was the fastest swimmer to the 100, had a pretty solid third 50 (though not as good as Matsuda’s), though his time drifted up to a 30.63 on the last length: the slowest amongst all 8 finalists. If he can really grit his teeth on that final 50 tomorrow night, it could come down to a last stroke with him and Matsuda, where Phelps has a significant size advantage.
The big surprise was China’s Yin Chen taking the 2nd seed in 1:54.80, which is almost half-a-second better than he’s been in this two year cycle. Austria’s Jinko Dujic was 4th (1:54.94) and the other Chinese swimmer Wu Peng, the National Record holder who trains out of Club Wolverine, was 5th. The rest of the finalists were the gold and silver medalists at last year’s Youth Olympics Bence Biczo (of Hungary, officially passing the crown from Laszlo Cseh) and Chad le Clos of South Africa; and Poland’s Pawel Korzeniowski, who’s the standard-bearer for the impressive Polish 200 fly group.
American Tyler Clary fell just out of the medals in 9th place; I never really saw this 200 fly as a potential medal for him, so he might do well to drop it in London and focus on the 200 back and 400 IM (though I don’t expect that to actually happen).
Full men’s 200 fly semifinal results.
Women’s 100 breaststroke final – MEDAL RACE
In the women’s 100 breaststroke, as much as we hoped that American Rebecca Soni might finally end the World Record drought, she was as spent as we observed after yesterday’s semi-final. Based on the way she went after the two swims, she was clearly using the semi-final to send a message to her competitors, and it worked in a big way.
Soni won in 1:05.05, off of her 1:04.91, from semis, followed by Leisel Jones in 1:06.25. For Jones, that was nearly 7-tenths of a second slower than she was in 2010, and slower also than she swam at Aussie Nationals. There may have been a microm of intimidation from how fast Soni was in the semi-final reflected in Jones’ time, though she did what she needed to do to take the silver.
She took that silver by a pretty sizable margin over China’s Liping Ji in 1:06.52, who held off a hard-finishing Yuliya Efimova of Russia (1:06.56) for bronze. Efimova swam her second 50 about two-tenths faster than Ji, but just ran out of room at the end. With one more stroke, she likely would’ve taken the podium.
The top 8 were finished out by Sun Ye of China (1:07.08), Rikke Pederson of Denmark (1:07.28), Jillian Tyler of Canada (1:07.64), and the Netherlands’ Moniek Nijhuis (1:07.97).
Full women’s 100 breaststroke results.
Final Thoughts
That men’s 100 backstroke will go down as one of the great finishes in World Championship history, as it’s extremely rare for a tie to come outside of a sprint freestyle race. Also, we continue to learn the hard way to NEVER count out the chinese swimmers in a race over 100 meters. Xuanxu Li’s 1500 free and Yin Chen’s 200 fly semi-final swim confirmed that these Chinese swimmers appear to have made it their strategy to lurk behind until the final 50 meters, and then sprint for home and shock the world. It seems to be a positive strategy for them so far, and besides that is putting on a great show for the home crowd.
The Americans seem to be really coming around in this meet. With the big stars finally kicking in, they earned two golds, from Soni and Lochte, and a bronze from Natalie Coughlin. Though the men’s backstrokers didn’t score a medal, Nick Thoman went a career-textile-best, and David Plummer went a career-any suit-best, in the 100 backstroke. They were less than three tenths out of the French pair, which makes the American medley relay in excellent position to take gold.
Medal Table (Pool Swimming Only)
The Americans, with their two victories, lept to the top of the medal table after three days of competition. They now have both the most total medals (9) and the most gold medals (3) of any team in the field. China also earned a 2nd gold medal (Zhao Jing), and France knocked two out in the same race to sit 3rd. The Australians are also doing well with 6 total medals (only 1 gold) and the Germans have three (all bronze). If you were to add in Germany’s open water medals (4 total), then they are sitting much higher on this table.
| Rank | Nation | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  United States |
3 | 3 | 3 | 9 |
| 2 |  China |
2 | 1 | 3 | 6 |
| 3 |  France |
2 | 1 | 1 | 4 |
| 4 |  Australia |
1 | 4 | 1 | 6 |
| 5 |  Italy |
1 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| 6 |  Brazil |
1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
 Denmark |
1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | |
 Netherlands |
1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | |
 Norway |
1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | |
 South Korea |
1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | |
| 11 |  Great Britain |
0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
 Russia |
0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | |
| 13 |  Germany |
0 | 0 | 3 | 3 |
| 14 |  Japan |
0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
 South Africa |
0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | |
| Total | 14 | 12 | 13 | 39 | |
50s wouldn’t affect swimmers at all.
Coutts did 100 fly/200 IM prelims AND semis and still anchored 400FR in 53.3
You would think that the coaches will have to put Hardy on the breaststroke leg in the morning. A 1:08+ from Beard isn’t going to cut it. Hardy has been 1:05 this year so she has “earned” it, so to speak.
Franklin seemed to do 2-3 events per day at every meet she swam this year, preparing possibly for medley relay duty. I think she will be ok.
maybe hardy on breast and weir or someone on end?
Will USA use any final swimmer for their MR morning swim? Pelton-Beard-Magusson-Hardy/Weir lineup looks shaky to me if everyone else decide to use their full-strength lineup.
Will Netherlands attend the Medley Relay?
lostriver – yep, men’s and women’s. Assuming we’re talking about the women, with their breaststroker Moniek Nijhuis making the final in the 100, things look much better for a medal for them. Still not positive what we’ll get from Kromowidjojo on the freestyle leg, but she’ll need a good swim as the Americans will have a big advantage on the butterfly and breaststroke legs.
In terms of the Americans…the good news is that just about every top medley relay will have similar conflicts. I don’t think the 50 fly final will take much out of Vollmer (the 100 didn’t seem to affect her on the 400 free relay), and same with Soni. I think Franklin will be affected the most,… Read more »
Soni–50 Breast semifinal
Vollmer–50 fly final
Franklin–200 back final
They also have these events on that day. Will it affect the result of MR?
Heemskerk will win 100/200. China’s men and women are in real trouble for 800 FR. Both will be lucky to get onto podium. British women are in trouble for not making final in 800 FR. Ye and Rice will have a huge battle for 400 IM.
1. BIedermann seems to be in the best shape of his life, and yet he is still 3 seconds slower in the 200 free than his suited WR.
2. The men 200 free was much slower than I expected. C’mon, 1:44.44? 10 years ago, the winning time was already 1:44.0
3. Park was much slower than I expected,where I thought he could go sub 1:44. and I was wrong about Lochte. He was playing possum throughout the season and didn’t show his hand. I mean, he was still 1:49 just 3 weeks ago!! And his turns and underwater, oh my god!
4. Will we get the biggest upset of the meet when Heemskerk dethrone Pelligrini? On that note, Friis will… Read more »