British Olympic Trials

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Heats start at 9am GMT. Finals start at 6:30pm GMT

Breaking Down Sarah Sjöström's 1:55.23 200m Freestyle

Sarah Sjöström ended her time in London on a high after an impressive 1:55.23 effort in the 200m Free guest final. Dominating the field from the start she split 26.71 / 29.38 / 29.45 / 29.69.

What makes this swim so impressive is the comparison to her 200m Free final in Shanghai. For the first 100m it was a mirror image of tonight's swim, in Shanghai she split 26.77 / 29.36 before coming back over a second slower in 30.31 / 29.97.

Sjöström has had a tremendous finish to 2011 and start to 2012, and her ability to bring races home has been one of the key reasons behind her success. With a full taper ahead of her, it will be fascinating to see where she can drop even more time in this event.

As a comparison, here are some of the main competitors in the 200m Freestyle and their splits (in bold the fastest split of the group)

Sjöström ---- 26.71 / 29.38 / 29.45 / 29.69 - 1:55.23
Franklin ----- 27.09 / 29.35 / 29.38 / 29.24 - 1:55.06
Heemskerk - 26.90 / 28.66 / 29.71 / 30.27 - 1:55.54
Pellegrini ---- 27.62 / 29.42 / 29.14 / 29.40 - 1:55.58
Palmer ------ 27.65 / 29.20 / 29.33 / 29.55 - 1:55.73
Barratt ------ 27.66 / 29.27 / 29.46 / 29.35 - 1:55.74

If you add in the likes of Camille Muffat and Allison Schmitt when the Olympics roll around, it is going to be a wild final.

British Olympic Trials - Race Videos

For international readers who haven't been able to watch the racing live, here are the finals so far. Courtesy of Swimming.org

Women's 400 IM Final

Taking A Closer Look at Hannah Miley's 4:32.67 400m IM

Day One of the British Olympic trials saw Hannah Miley set a new textile lifetime best in the 400m IM and moved herself to the top of this year's world rankings.

Her time of 4:32.67 was 1.55 seconds faster than her silver medal winning performance at the World Championships and brings her to within a second of Elizabeth Beisel's textile best time from Shanghai.

As one of the comments on this site pointed out, Miley's 300m split was actually faster than Beisel's. So where has Miley made improvements since Shanghai?

Miley Shanghai - Fly - 30.3/1:03.97 - Back - 35.6/1:10.64 - Breast - 38.3/1:16.98 - Free - 32.2/1:02.63
Miley London - Fly - 29.8/1:03.10 - Back - 34.7/1:09.36 - Breast - 37.9/1:16.77 - Free - 32.2/1:03.44

Miley's improved her splits on every stroke up until 300m with the biggest improvements on her Backstroke and Butterfly. A notoriously slow starter, being closer to the field over the first 200m should serve Miley well.

Elizabeth Beisel established herself as the clear world number one in this event, here is how her Shanghai splits match up to those of the Scot (with overall lead in brackets). In a virtual head-to-head the lead changes with every stroke:

Beisel Shanghai - Fly - 29.6/1:03.32 (+0.22 behind Miley) - Back - 34.7/1:08.64 (-0.50 in front) - Breast - 38.5/1:17.84 (+0.57) - Free - 31.2/1:01.98 (-0.89)

Miley's greatest weapon in the Medley continues to be her Breaststroke. Among the world's top IMers only Caitlin Leverenz has a better Breaststroke leg and until now the American hasn't been able to match Miley's Backstroke or Freestyle. The biggest step forward that Miley made yesterday was on her Backstroke, getting within 0.7 seconds of Beisel's world class Backstroke.

The challenge now for Miley (and her coach who happens to be her father) is to make sure that she can drop even more time at the Olympics. It was something she had failed to do in 2008 and 2009, but has dropped time in both of the last two major championships, boding well for London.

The only negative from yesterday's swim was the freestyle leg. It was a full 0.8 seconds slower than Miley's closing 100 at Worlds and nearly 1.5 seconds slower than Beisel's Shanghai closing speed. Given that Miley is a more than competent freestyler, this comes as a slight surprise. Both women's freestyle times are similar, in 2011 Beisel swam 1:59.17 and 4:08.57 in the 200m and 400m Free, compared to Miley's 1:59.34 and 4:09.59.

At the Olympics with the home crowd cheering on Miley and potentially being at the head of the field, it may be enough to get Great Britain off to a golden start.

Ellen Gandy Will Not Wear The New Speedo Suit At Trials

Ellen Gandy will be competing in the closest race at trials, the women's 100m Fly, and she will be doing it a supposedly inferior suit. The below is taken from Gandy's column in The Guardian.

All the talk on the circuit right now is about the new Speedo suits, which launched last December. Speedo say it is their fastest ever. People were trying them out in NSW and will be again at the trials. I've decided I'm not going to wear one in the trials. I've been thinking about it a lot and there is no way I would change any other aspect of my swimming, like my start or my turn, a week before an important competition. I just don't need that kind of distraction. Everyone expects me to wear the latest thing, but I love my old Speedo suit and I reckon that if you're comfortable in what you are wearing it doesn't really matter. I believe I can achieve whatever I'm in.

Choosing which suit to wear depends so much on the individual, on body shape and what you feel comfortable in. So some people absolutely love Speedo's new suit, and some people don't. I know one girl who wore it for one race, took it off and it ripped. If I win selection for the Olympics then I will definitely try it out, but right now I'm sticking with what works for me.

Looks like we are back talking about suits again.

British Olympic Trials - Predictions

The BBC's Karen Pickering and Steve Parry have made their picks ahead of the British Olympic Trials, which start tomorrow.

I've added my picks to the list. Use the comment section to make your picks, agree, disagree, troll... all comments are welcome!

Breaking News: Aleksandra Herasimenia Denies Elbowing Alicia Coutts

There has been a lot of speculation surrounding 'Elbow Gate', the allegations from Alicia Coutts that she was elbowed in the head and spat at before the 100m Freestyle final at the World Championships in Shanghai. 

Coutts still has not revealed the name of the alleged culprit, but did say that it was one of the European finalists in the race. Since the story broke last week we have seen Ranomi Kromowidjojo cleared by Coutts herself on Twitter as well as a denial from Femke Heemskerk. Fran Halsall saw the incident, heard the apology and forgot who was involved describing the incident as 'a non entity'.

In a Speed Endurance exclusive we can now add another denial to that list. Joint gold medal winner Aleksandra Herasimenia.

I caught up with Herasimenia and in a strongly worded denial she told me that the allegations were 'stupid' and questioned the authenticity of the claims. 'I know that I did not do it, and Jeanette (Ottesen) too, I spoke to her. Nor could she do that!', she said. 'I did not see anything and so I think all this is fiction!'

Ian Thorpe Will Swim 400m Free This Weekend

This weekend in Zurich will see the return of Ian Thorpe to an event he dominated for the best part of a generation, the 400m Freestyle. In his last competition before the Australian Olympic Trials, Thorpedo will compete in both the 100m and 400m Freestyle.

RESULTS

While this development is being put forward as simply an experiment for racing, it does raise some interesting questions.

Could Thorpe make the Australia team on the 400m Free?

As strange as it sounds given his focus on sprinting, the 400m Free might turn out to offer Thorpe a slim remote surprise chance at making it to London 2012. Australia's top two last year were Ryan Napoleon (3:45.16, 6th in the world last year) and Thomas Fraser-Holmes (3:46.54, 10th in the world last year). To get down to 3:45 will likely prove too much for Thorpe, but it should be remembered that those times are over 5 seconds down on his best time.


It is also worth mentioning that Leigh Nugent didn't 100% rule out the move up to 400m. "The 400m is more about experimenting with his racing, not so much about what he would be intending to do at trials... It's pretty much off the agenda (for the trials). But he's been going pretty well. He has been pretty happy with his progress."


'Pretty much off the agenda' does not equal 'Off the agenda'.




Would Thorpe have a chance to win the 400m Free in London?


No.


Sun Yang, Park Tae-Hwan, Yannick Agnel and Paul Biedermann are too good for that to happen.



What will the 400 Free tell us about his 200 Free?

So far Thorpe has been struggling at the end of his races, whether they be over 100m or 200m. Seeing him race a 400m Free should give us some clues to his conditioning in his last competition before Olympic Trials.

Unless the entire comeback has been a smoke and mirror show, Thorpe needs to show increased endurance at the end of his races. Chances are if he struggles in the 400m Free in Zurich, he is going to struggle in the 200m Free at Trials, his best chance at making the Olympic team.

What should we make of Leigh Nugent's optimism?

The last time we saw a story about Thorpe and Nugent, it focused on Thorpedo's lack of fitness, motivation and confidence. Now, less than four weeks on, everything is smelling of roses?

Thorpe's been going 'pretty well, he has been pretty happy with his progress'.

Well, I will still be pretty surprised if he makes the Aussie Olympic team. I hope I'm wrong there though.


Why hasn't there been a vote on this blog for such a long time?

Good point. New vote launched. Will Ian Thorpe make the Australian Olympic Team. Yes/No? You decide.


(Hat tip to The Swimmers Daily for the Thorpe story)