Minneapolis Grand Prix, Nov. 11-13

Michael Phelps has won the 100 fly and 200 free today pretty handily, each by over a second on his competitors. I guess those altitude training trips do wonders. That and maybe he's finally got his mojo back or something.

Phelps just cruised a 2:01 in the 2fly prelims. We'll see what he can do in finals later. Dara Torres just won her 50 free heat with a 25.46! :cheerleader:

I'm so used to seeing Phelps swim terrible in these off meets that I'm not sure what to make of this. He may even be under 1:56 for the 200 fly. I'm looking forward to seeing what he does in the 100 fr and the 100 bk. I'm thinking he may swim the 100 and/or 200 bk at trials next year since Peirsol retired.

1:56.1 for Phelps in the 200 fly. He won the 100 back.

39-yo masters swimmer Erika Braun (Raleigh Area Masters) was just a little off trials cuts in the morning, made the "C" final. www.gophersports.com/.../index.htm I saw Kevin Doak's name in there too for the 100 back. Any others?

www.swimmingworldmagazine.com/.../28703.asp In the B final, Brian Jacobson, who lives and trains in Minneapolis, swam a 23.42 to qualify for the Olympic Trials at age 37, barely ahead of the standard of 23.49. Jacobson will turn 38 on Nov. 25, which now makes him the second-oldest male to qualify for the U.S. Olympic Trials, bumping Swimming World's Jeff Commings down the list, as he will not be 38 until next February. Steve West still reigns as the oldest male in history to qualify for the event. Jacobson is a former member of the U.S. national team and former Masters world record holder.

There were 4 USMS Masters swimmers swimming in the first ever Professional Duel Meet of the newly formed Professional Swimming League. I was in attendance last night and I plan on attending tonight. The purpose of this PSL is to provide opportunities for post graduate and professional swimmers to swim in a dual meet format similar to what they do in College Swimming. Most of the events are sprint to middle distance and the meet takes between an hour in a half to 2 hours to complete. Fans seemed to want to see short fast swimming. The format is LCM. I received the PSL dailey newsletter today and they are very happy with the results of Day 1. Michigan Masters and PSL swimmer Kevin Doak is helping with the planning of the meet by providing newsletter updates and Web Administrator responsibilities. Here are the contents of the newsletter. Day 1 was a huge success! Swim Fans, The First day of the Pro Dual 1 was a huge success! Thank you so much for your support! We had a great spectator showing and plenty of volunteers as well! We were proud to award our 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners with cash prizes totaling $3,500 dollars courtesy of our Sponsors! We were happy to have some live entertainment between events from the U of M Dance Team and the local singing group the Friars! Special thanks to SwimmingWorldMagazine for the help with the live video and news article: Videos: tv.swimmingworldmagazine.com/.../2011-pro-dual-meet-1 Article: www.swimmingworldmagazine.com/.../28767.asp. Live Results: www.mgoblue.com/.../index.htm Event Website: http://proswimleague.com Along with Kevin Doak, Nick Brunelli, Bryan Lundquist, and Ian Hulme were the USMS Masters swimmers in the meet. I must say for a $10 ticket price, you got to see a lot of great swimming and 16 Olympic and 14 National Team members. A lot of foreign swimmers swam in this dual meet. The swimmers themselves got behind this and are not doing to earn money but hopefully to get this PSL off the ground. The community got behind this and helped not just with sponsorship but with families boarding swimmers to help with there finances. Video broadcast will be available tonight at Swimming Worlds event landing page www.swimmingworldmagazine.com/.../28745.asp