…been watching the Manchester swimming world championships and enjoying that as much as i did the indoor cycling…in that i enjoyed Chris Hoy etc and now I’m with Mark Foster…best time in the semis for the 50m sprint so lets see what he does in the final tonight and of course the Olympics…one thing i wanted to know…how strong’s the field for this…I mean, who’s missing if at all thats gonna be a force in Beijing…cos i hope he gets a medal there…
I watch it on Eurosport and BBC2 as both are available over here via satellite of course…I prefer the BBC coverage though cos of the interviews…
I think Foster is 38 and won his first 50m world title in '93. Thats impressive. What is intersting is that he has the unsual standpoint of masses of gym work and not too much mileage. He is often cited as saying that for a 50m, mileage isn’t as relevant. Who’d have thunk it…
…as an aside, a good friend of mine, Ian Martinez, swum with him at Loughborough University…Ian’s older than him and used to be his bait at times he recalls…funny that…anyway…says he was and always will be the bad boy of swimming…he always had his fan club of women at meets etc etc…so thats his appeal really…its like comparing Cantona to Shearer…you want personalities don’t you…
Myself and Ian always comment on this mileage vs weights thing and its obvious to us sprinters are wasting time swimming that much when they have to tear a new line down the pool floor with their speed…its obvious…look at Dara Torres too…loads of gym work…to me is like for traithletes who compete in tri’s in the sea mostly…hello…you should be training out there not in the pool all the time…
That was from a Times article when he broke the WR - thought I would save the URL of the picture as the technique was so strange. I don’t have any other ones though.
funny that…as he’s got the slowest stroke outta the water and looks smoothest always and is famous for it…underwater shots at Manchester on TV are the worst ever though so i hope we get good camera work from the Chinese…im sure…the camera operators will get shot/deported/put in jail if not…
Steve, we can’t expect the underwater shots from Manchester to be up to much as the pool was placed in the arena purely for the event and hence is just a liner and not a tiled bootom which a tracked camera can roll on. If you are of a certain age you will remember this happening in the Paris omnidome where they had the F1 triathlon in back in the day. I can’t remember the exact name of the arena in Paris but I am sure someone will pipe up as it’s been used for windsurfing and motorcycle trials too.
You are right about Foster he’s always done things his way and with reasonable success especially with the gym work over mileage for the sprint events; not dissimilar to that which Torre Dannes (sp) is doing now.
…he always had his fan club of women at meets etc etc…so thats his appeal really…
Perhaps so, but the only fan club he is interested in is Colin Jackson - ex-world record holder in the 110 Hurdles!
I swam with Mark through the '80’s and he always had amazing talent, but often missed races so he could get high score on space invaders…It is fantastic to see him still with the world elite…perhaps I should get back in the pool more than twice a week!?
Sorry to tell you it’s actually a pretty weak field for a World Championships- save for the Brits, who have a full team there a couple of weeks after their Olympic Trials, it’s largely a meet filled with promising juniors, national B types (Australia is using the meet as something of a consolation prize for not qualifying for Beijing) and the occasional Big Name Swimmer who isn’t fully tapered for the meet.
Ryan Lochte is the third seed in the 50 free finals, much to the amusement of everyone including himself. Fully tapered or no, he’s gonna be going balls out for that ever popular 50 free/400 IM double victory. Duje Dragajna’s outside smoke in the race, and the only other guy in the race besides foster who has a shot at the Beijing final, IMO.
Best race of the morning- Pawel Korzeniowski and Robert Margalis needing a swim-off to decide the 8th spot in the finals of the men’s 400M free. Margalis wins the swim-off: 3:43.23 to 3:43.31
thanks for the info man…as im 41 years old im totally impressed and inspired by Foster, Dara Torres and all athletes in whatever sport of around my age etc…but still…world records mean it aint such a weak field no???
Best race of the morning- Pawel Korzeniowski and Robert Margalis needing a swim-off to decide the 8th spot in the finals of the men’s 400M free. Margalis wins the swim-off: 3:43.23 to 3:43.31
Reminds me of the 96 Olympics 200m Freestyle. In the Semis Paul Palmer and 200IM record holder Jani Sievinen tied for the 8th fastest time, so they had to have a swim-off. They both swam exactly the same time AGAIN! Sievinen then gave up since he had bigger fish to fry.
