Top 50 Swimmers of 2012 - 40 to 31

The second annual Speed Endurance Top 50 Swimmers of the Year is upon us. There is no set-in-stone criteria, but as you would expect, this year the Olympic Games carried the most weight in the decision making process. Other outstanding achievements away from London were also acknowledged, but it took an extraordinary feat to better an Olympic medallist. Also worth noting, relay medals alone were not valued highly, however race-changing relay contributions were.

The second part of the list takes us from 40 to 31...

40. Nick Thoman - 2012 Highlight - Being the '2' of the USA's 1-2 in the men's 100 backstroke final in London.

Thoman gets bonus points for having to come through a loaded US trials final to make the US Olympic team. David Plummer was sub-53 seconds in Omaha, with Ben Hesen 4th in 53.0, but Thoman's 52.86 booked his ticket. With his 52.92 swim in the Olympic final he took the silver medal getting the better of a some big name rivals including Ryosuke Irie, Camille Lacourt, Liam Tancock and Helge Meeuw. Thoman's year has undoubtedly been overshadowed by Matt Grevers, but he deserves his spot in the top 50.

39. Thiago Pereira - 2012 Highlight - Finishing as the highest placed Brazilian in London with his silver medal in the 400 IM.

Despite finishing behind Ryan Lochte by over three and a half seconds, Pereira was still good enough to pick up the silver medal ahead of the likes of Michael Phelps, Chad le Clos and Kosuke Hagino. Having finished 5th in the 200 IM in Athens and 4th in Beijing, Pereira's hard work payed off as he finally secured an Olympic medal at the third time of trying. His poor freestyle leg came back to haunt him in the 200 IM final as he turned 2nd at 150m, only to be passed by both Michael Phelps and Laszlo Cseh to drop him down to fourth.

38. Cullen Jones - 2012 Highlight - Getting his hand on the wall second in the hotly contested 50 freestyle final in London.

Florent Manaudou's heroics may have led some to overlook Cullen Jones' first Olympic medal in an individual event. Jones was able to match his semi-final time to finish 2nd in the final ahead of Cesar Cielo, Bruno Fratus, Anthony Ervin, Roland Schoeman, George Bovell and Eamon Sullivan. He also swam a fine 47.60 leg in the USA's silver medal winning 4x100 free relay. He showed good resilience to come back after he placed 16th in the 100 free semis.

37. Ryan Cochrane - 2012 Highlight - Staying with Sun Yang for 600m before finishing with silver in the 1500 freestyle in London

The 1500 was expected to be a formality for Sun Yang, but Ryan Cochrane kept the final interesting for 600m. Despite being dropped by the Chinese champion, he still held on valiantly for silver and became the fourth fastest 1500 swimmer in history (third fastest in textile). Along with Ous Mellouli, Cochrane ensured that the London podium was two thirds the same as in Beijing. Cochrane also just missed out on the 400 final by 0.01 seconds, finishing 9th after the heats.

36. Takeshi Matsuda - 2012 Highlight - Playing a big part in one of the most exciting races of London 2012 with his bronze in the 200 butterfly

Matsuda ran out of steam a couple of metres out from the wall, otherwise he might have been the man to take down Michael Phelps in his signature event. Instead he finished third in 1:53.21, the fourth fastest performance in textile. Matsuda's 51.20 fly leg (1.16 seconds faster than his individual 100 fly) in the 4x100 medley relay also gave Japan enough of a cushion over Australia and James Magnussen for them to hang on for silver.

35. Christian Sprenger - 2012 Highlight - Breaking 59 seconds in the 100 breaststroke to pick up an Olympic silver medal

Sprenger had looked strong in the heats (fastest qualifier) and semi (winning semi-final 2), but it still came as a big surprise to see the Australian break through 59 seconds to win silver behind Cameron van der Burgh's world record. In the two years after the tech-suits were banned, Sprenger hadn't been back under the minute barrier in the 100 breast, but in 2012 it all came good swimming under the mythical barrier 5 times. Sprenger split 59.05 in the 4x100 Medley relay for the bronze medal winning Australia, but was out-split by Kosuke Kitajima (58.64), with Japan taking silver.

34. Anastasia Zueva - 2012 Highlight - Bouncing back from 4th in the 100 backstroke to win silver in the 200 back

After finishing 4th and 5th in Beijing in the backstrokes and 4th in London in the 100 back, Zueva must have been cursing her Olympic luck, which made her silver medal in the 200 backstroke all the more impressive. After 150m of the final, the race for silver looked wide open, but Zueva mustered the fastest closing 50 of the race to finish behind Missy Franklin. She became only the second woman in history to dip under 2:06 in textile (the other being Franklin).

33. Rebecca Adlington - 2012 Highlight - Her hard fought bronze in the 400 freestyle in a time of 4:03.01

Adlington's double bronze performance in London confirmed her status as Britain's most successful ever Olympic swimmer and was a fine return. The only disappointment came from the fact that she had been faster in both the 400 and 800 free at British trials back in March, something that plighted most of the British team in London. Given the form of Camille Muffat and Allison Schmitt it would have been a tall order to improve on her bronze in the 400 free. In the 800 free the silver escaped her grasp, but the gold was always going to be difficult with the form of Katie Ledecky on the day. Post-Olympics Adlington cycled 450km through Zambia for charity, which unfortunately does not count towards this list.

32. Elizabeth Beisel - 2012 Highlight - Her silver medal in the 400 IM. It took Ye Shiwen's world record to beat her.

After her stunning 400 IM world title in Shanghai, Beisel was the heavy favourite going into London. Unfortunately she came up against Ye Shiwen and her incredible 4:28.43 world record. Beisel swam a tremendous race, leading at 300m by 0.8 seconds. She finished half a second faster than her winning time from Shanghai. She ends the year with 3 of the top 5 swims in the 400 IM. She also picked up a second individual medal with bronze in the 200 backstroke behind Franklin and Zueva. 

31. Ryosuke Irie - 2012 Highlight - Beating Ryan Lochte in the Olympic 200 backstroke final, ending up with the silver medal

After finishing 5th as an 18 year old in Beijing, Irie put together 4 tremendous years in the run up to London. Irie's consistency has been tremendous and he owns 5 of the top 10 200 back swims this year. In London he was able to save his fastest swim of the year for the Olympic final (1:53.78, the third fastest swim in textile). Going into the final he must have thought that if he beat Lochte, the gold would be his, but unfortunately Tyler Clary scuppered that for him. Irie also picked up bronze in the 100 back final with a sub-53 second swim and gave Japan a great launching pad in the 4x100 medley relay that won silver with a 52.92 lead-off (slightly faster than his individual final time).


Top 50 so far...

50. Brendan Hansen
49. Oussama Mellouli
48. Yulia Efimova
47. Aya Terakawa
46. Cesar Cielo
45. Yevgeny Korotyshkin
44. Katinka Hosszu
43. Melanie Schlanger
42. Lu Ying
41. Vladimir Morozov
40. Nick Thoman
39. Thiago Pereira
38. Cullen Jones
37. Ryan Cochrane
36. Takeshi Matsuda
35. Christian Sprenger
34. Anastasia Zueva
33. Rebecca Adlington
32. Elizabeth Beisel
31. Ryosuke Irie

Maria Lenk Trophy

April 24 - 29

This week at the Maria Lenk Trophy Cesar Cielo gets his first chance to respond to rival James Magnussen's startling times set at the Australian Olympic trials.

As we saw last October, Cielo changed his race tactics in the 100m Free as a result of Magnussen's back end speed. At Pan Ams (at altitude) Cielo's stand out swim was his 47.04 relay split with a final 50m split of 24.53, a big shift in strategy from his homecoming split of 25.38 from Shanghai.

Unfortunately for the Brazilian, Magnussen still has the same back end speed he had in Shanghai and has added the front end speed to match (Magnussen's splits: 22.68 / 24.42 (47.10) ).

As it stands now on the eve of the Maria Lenk trophy, Magnussen is still a relay takeover faster than Cielo.

Psych Sheet
Competition Schedule
Results

Live Streaming - Showing finals at 19:00 BRT / 1:00am BST (h/t to swimswam for the video find)

Other Highlights:

Thiago Pereira - One of the most consistent performers over the last few years in the 200m IM & 400m IM,  needs to bounce back after a disappointing World Champs.
Fred Bousquet - Must still be sore after missing out on London, and goes up against his nemesis Cielo.
Bruno Fratus - Has emerged as one of the few men that can swim consistently sub-22 seconds over 50m Free, his semi final time of 21.76 in Shanghai would have been good enough for silver in the final, however he couldn't reproduce that form and ended up 5th.
Marcelo Chierighini - The sprinter with bags of raw talent has had an extended period of time at Auburn under Brett Hawke to hone his craft, it's time to see what time he can put up in the 100m Free.
Felipe Silva - The 50m speedster has shown the ability to make a splash in the 100m. His 1:00.01 from the heats of Shanghai highlighted his ability, but he underwhelmed in the semi final with a 1:00.73.
Jeanette Ottesen / Lotte Friis / Laure Manaudou / Mireia Belmonte - All four European women have qualified for London and it will be interesting to see where they are with their training 100 days out.

FINA/ARENA Swimming World Cup - Berlin Recap

As expected, there were a number of fast times from the Berlin leg of the World Cup series. In a notoriously fast pool, the large number of international swimming stars did not disappoint.

Speed EnduranceTop Performers

Femke Heemskerk - 100m Free - 51.96, 200m Free - 1:52.42, 100m Back - 57.72

The star of the meet. Heemskerk destroyed a quality field in both the 100 and 200m Freestyle. She became the 3rd fastest woman ever over 200m Free and moved up to 8th all-time in the 100m Free. Heemskerk also smoked a 57.72 to win the 100m Back in the 6th fastest time of the year (notably ahead of Natalie Coughlin's best effort of 2010 so far).

Now, if only Heemskerk had some other lightning quick Dutch female sprinters to swim a relay with...

Dana Vollmer - 100m Fly - 55.72, 100m Free - 52.50, 200m Free - 1:53.67, 50m Fly 25.74

If Heemskerk takes the prize for swimmer of the meet, Vollmer just about takes performance of the meet for her 100m Fly effort of 55.72. Just 0.54 away from Diane Bui Duyet's World Record, Vollmer became the 3rd fastest ever in the event. She let Therese Alshammar take the race out (25.9 to her 27.3) but came back in an incredible 28.29. Bear in mind that most swimmers get faster as the World Cup series progresses, there might be more still to come from Vollmer.

Thiago Pereira - 200m IM - 1:52.81, 400m IM - 4:02.83, 100m IM - 52.59

No surprise that Thiago Pereira swam fast, he's been lights out throughout the entire SC season so far. Once again his best performance came in the 200m IM where he was under World Record pace by 0.37 at the 150m mark. Unfortunately he couldn't match the suited speed of Darian Townsend, an excellent Freestyler, on the final 50m, however he did come back faster than in Rio where he swam 1:52.72. (In Rio he was even faster at 150m - 0.83 seconds under WR pace).

As mentioned before... Pereira is getting close to Townsend's WR and could break it... Ryan Lochte could smash it.



A full set of results can be found here.

(Moscow World Cup starts tomorrow. Results will be here)

FINA/ARENA Swimming World Cup - Singapore

Top swims from the Singapore leg of the FINA/ARENA Swimming World Cup:-

Thiago Pereira - 200m IM - 1:53.45 - 951 Points - Game over for the overall men's point title. Pereira has now notched up the maximum available 75 points from the first three legs of the World Cup series. He leads Darian Townsend by 36 points with just four legs remaining. With Pereira scheduled to compete in each of the remaining stops on the tour, the only viable way for him to be overhauled is if world records start dropping, and Pereira has been the only man this year to threaten a world mark. Pereira's time of 1:53.45 improved upon the time set a few days previously in Beijing, but was 0.73 down on his world leading time from Rio.

One of the races to look forward to at the World Shortcourse Champs will be Pereira v Ryan Lochte. It might also be the race that sees 2010's first World Record go down. Darian Townsend's 1:51.55 might be within the reach of Pereira. It's definitely within reach for Lochte.

Therese Alshammar - 100m Butterfly - 56.32 - 934 Points - Game over for the overall women's point title. Ok... Alshammar doesn't have the title sown up to the same degree as Pereira has, however by taking 25 points in Singapore (total of 55 for the series) she has gone a long way towards making it a formality reality. Her closest rival is Julia Smit, who is back on 30 points. At this stage Alshammar just needs to score consistently in the last four rounds to wrap up the points title. Ominously for her rivals, the Swedish sprint queen is also getting faster round by round (57.04 in Rio, 56.80 in Beijing, 56.32 in Singapore).

Julia Smit - 200m IM - 2:08.14 - 919 Points - I wrote back in August, that until Julia Smit proves otherwise, I'm marking her down as a short course specialist. After a swift 2:08 in Singapore I haven't changed my opinion. She is now ranked third in the world, just half a second behind Australians Emily Seebohm and Kotuku Ngawati. This year Smit also broke the NCAA & American record in the 200yd IM but has only been able to manage a 2:12.5 in LC metres (22nd in the world this year, 8th fastest American). With the domestic competition so fierce in the 200m IM, Smit is going to need to improve in a LC pool if she is going to make future national teams.

Natalie Coughlin - 100m Backstroke - 57.78 - 873 Points - Coughlin was victorious on her return to short course swimming, a discipline she dominated for most of the last decade. Her time of 57.78 is off her very best from 2008 (56.51), but represents a successful return. Emily Seebohm leads the world on an impressive 56.58. Gao Chang (57.45) and Belinda Hocking (57.67) have also been faster than Coughlin's time this year. The 100m Backstroke should be a fantastic race in Dubai and Coughlin will need to get back down to her best time or better to stand a chance. With the quality of her starts and turns, I would find it hard to bet against her.

If you've read down this far, you're probably a pretty big fan of swimming. If that is the case, check out Fantasy Swimming. You pick the Top 3 swimmers per event and get points for each correct selection. They have the remaining legs of the World Cup available to make your picks, as well as Short Course Worlds.

FINA/ARENA Swimming World Cup - Beijing

The two days of swimming at the FINA/ARENA World Cup in Beijing have produced some outstanding times.


Some of the highlights below:-

Thiago Pereira - 200m IM - 1:54.21 - 932 Points. Pereira took another maximum 25 points from Beijing to match his 25 from Rio. With a full 50 points from the first two legs and due to compete at all the remaining legs of the World Cup, the competition for this year's World Cup prize for top male point scorer might just be over. One possible cause for concern is the difference in time (1.49 seconds) from his win in Rio (1:52.72) and Beijing (1:54.21).

Darian Townsend - 200m IM - 1:54.26 - 931 Points. Pereira only just held on to win the 200m IM from Townsend. At 150m Pereira was 1.44 seconds up on Townsend but only finished 0.05 seconds ahead of the South African. The two are due to go head to head again in Singapore this weekend and if Townsend can get even closer at the 150m we might see these positions reversed.

Gao Chang - 26.00 - 50m Back - 966 Points. The top scoring swim of the meet came from Gao in the 50m Back. It becomes the 5th fastest all time performance over 50m Back and is just 0.3 seconds shy of Sanja Jovanovic' World Record of 25.70. The Chinese Backstroker is putting together a strong 2010, she's now ranked No.1 in the world for LC and SC 50m Back and is 6th in the world in the LC 100m Back rankings with the Asian Games still to come this year.

Liu Jing - 400m Free - 4:00.55 - 931 Points. Liu Jing took the maximum available 25 points with victory in the women's 400m Free. She becomes the 16th fastest all-time performer in the event. Still a long way behind Laure Manaudou's textile best time of 3:56.09 though. (Manaudou's time from 2007 is one of the most impressive short course swims ever, despite being set before the suit era, it remains the third fastest swim ever).

Therese Alshammar - 56.80 - 100m Fly - 910 Points. Alshammar suddenly looks a little vulnerable in the race for the women's top points scorer. Despite winning the 100m Fly in an excellent time of 56.80, Alshammar was only able to pick up 5 points. Fortunately for the Swedish sprint star, not one of the Chinese women who finished ahead of Alshammar in the points in Beijing will be competing at the next stop in Singapore. Hinkelein Schreuder is the only other woman to have scored points from the first two World Cup legs and she sits 17 points back of Alshammar.

Ye Shiwen - 400m IM - 4:28.67 - 917 Points/53.66 - 100m Free - 859 Points. 14 year old Ye Shiwen continued to impress in 2010 with a particularly impressive 400m IM swim. Trailing World Record holder Julia Smit for most of the race, Ye put in a devastating freestyle split of 58.97. Smit led by 2.08 seconds at 300m but could only manage a freestyle leg of 1:01.30 to take second in 4:28.92.

Ye Shiwen's time is all the more impressive as it came on the same evening as her victory in the 100m Free in a time of 53.66. Clearly a special talent.

Ye Shiwen's swims will come under scrutiny. Some people will doubt her times and suspect that to acheive so much at such a young age, she must be doped... strange that Yolane Kukla, just turned 15, Yannick Agnel, Vlad Morozov, Bence Biczo etc don't receive the same scepticism. I suspect this will come to the fore when the Asian Games are upon us, where I predict China will set a number of world leading times... Remember - All athletes should be innocent until proven guilty.

Full Results - Here
Men's Overall Points Leaderboard - Here
Women's Overall Points Leaderboard - Here