Michael Phelps continued his dominant performance at U.S. Nationals on Sunday with his third-of-three world-leading swims. After posting the Number One times of the year in the 200m butterfly (1:52.94) on Friday and then the 100m butterfly (50.45) on Saturday, Phelps crushed the field in the 200m IM with 1:54.75. (Read about it here.)
Phelps jumped out to half a body-length lead with the butterfly, and was already two body lengths ahead at the back-to-breast wall. He was under world record pace through the breaststroke leg, and finished just .75 short of the world mark, Ryan Lochte‘s 1:54.00.
His splits were 24.65 – 28.49 – 33.34 – 28.27 = 1:54.75
As a comparison, at the 2015 FINA World Championships, Ryan Lochte won the gold medal with:
Ryan Lochte: 25.10 – 29.29 – 33.34 – 28.08 = 1:55.81
In his post-race interview, Phelps said he was satisfied with his time, only a half-second off what he swam at the 2012 Olympics in London when he won gold with 1:54.27, ahead of Lochte’s silver-medal 1:54.90.
Phelps evoked how much he and Lochte enjoy racing each other in this event: “I’m looking forward to getting back in and competing with him.” With the world’s most dominant 200 IMers getting ready to gear up for Rio, American swim fans can already start to get excited about Team USA’s prospects in the event at the 2016 Olympic Games.
Now this is the Michael Phelps we all look up to. 3 world leading times after a decent 2014 and a DUI suspension is amazing. Look out Chad and Ryan, the king has returned.
While I do not doubt Phelps can replicate these times when needed, comparing times from Worlds and here with 100% precision are a bit hard
At Worlds, all guys had to go through 3 rounds where they could not cruise, while Phelps could swim easily then go all out on the evening, also he did not had relay duties.. Phelps morning 200 IM would not make semis at Kazan
Pool conditions were different too, same for the pressure (Phelps handles pressure on a superb level, but it is different to swim relaxed and with pressure)
Does Phelps have the ability to replicate those times? Definitely, otherwise he would not be Phelps, but this comparison is a bit unfair to Cseh,… Read more »
Rafael: it’s obvious what you wrote.
But it’s also true that Phelps, back-to back-to back (i.e in 3 days), swam the 3 best performances in the World in 3 events (in one, the 200 im, widely).
Not bad considering what happened at the end of 2014..
Still no men’s 100 fly A-Final race video posted by USA swimming on youtube.
Is it a joke?
It’s not funny anymore now!
I guess you had to be there.
Back to the race. Amazing performance once again by MP.
2 things to maybe explain his “average” last 50. We are so harsh! 🙂
1. His backstroke is not where it needs to be. He spends too much energy right now in that leg. Needs to find again an easier backstroke, more efficient, with better underwaters and overall less energy consumed. Then he will have more gas to finish.
2. He was alone and wasn’t pushed by anybody to finish his race.
Still one year to improve his overall shape (compared to last summer, it’s already day and light), to gain efficiency on his backstroke leg and to work on little technical things.
Off topic but swimswam needs seriously to create a second column of articles on the homepage..
The turnover of news is much too fast.
For example the live recap of world championships’ last day has already disappeared from the homepage, only a few hours after the meet was over.
We have barely enough time to read it that it has disappeared and replaced by something else.
Also, if I may, when you click on “view more stories” on the bottom, you are directed to a page where the same stories present in the homepage are displayed. This is an unnecessary passage. When I click on “view more stories”, I should be immediately directed to the second page.
Yes, this.
Seems like the announcer went out a little too hard on the front half… Didn’t have much left in the tank for the last 100.
i’m not sure if he did it on purpose but i actually thought it was a good decision to say nothing during the breast leg. the ENTIRE crowd was cheering for MP, you could almost hear a pin drop when his head was under the water. very cool moment
Well, this is too bad for any Americans other than Lochte who wanted to swim the 200 IM at the olympics.
Great swim, he looked a little awkward/short into the breakstroke/free turn and his freestyle breakout looked weird. Large chance of a 1:53, maybe even 1:53.5 🙂
Wow !
When Lochte trims down a little this is going to be a great race !
2 of the greatest all-round swimmers ever…….
Should be as good as it gets……