Seagurl, hate to disagree with you but, 3.5 seconds for the 400 IM and 1.21 seconds for the 200 IM are pretty big margins for those races. Don't know if Lochte can make up that much difference. Kind of hope he does, just to make the races a little closer.
Anybody think anyone will come close to Phelps in the 200 Free? And if so, who?
He's only in it for the money.
Sorry...I have to strongly disagree. He put in years of yardage and hard workouts before he got any monetary rewards! He deserves every penny of what he is getting right now. He wants to be the best in the world. I think it is awesome that swimmers are finally making a fraction of the money that other professional athletes make.
Can't base this opinion on anything factual.
But I think Phelps will continue to improve, especially in shorter races. He added weight training only recently and the full benefit is still ahead of him. I think Crocker must truly focus his training to beat Phelps in 2008.
Phelps is probably the USA's fastest 100 freestyler now. He continues to show that he is the strongest man in the water over the 2nd half of a race and he's improving most in the first half. Lochte is capable of an upset but the sun, the moon, and venus have to line up a certain way for Phelps to be beaten.
I think Peirsol has to worry about Lochte more than Phelps does.
He's only in it for the money.
Huh? Michael Phelps swims to be the best in the world. I'm sure he's thrilled to make a nice living from swimming, but I bet when he was setting age group records at 14 that he wasn't thinking about Speedo sponsorship. He was simply trying to win.
Phelps is only 21 but is steadily maturing as a person. He is respectful to his teammates and competitors yet a fierce competitor.
Seagurl, hate to disagree with you but, 3.5 seconds for the 400 IM and 1.21 seconds for the 200 IM are pretty big margins for those races. Don't know if Lochte can make up that much difference. Kind of hope he does, just to make the races a little closer.
Anybody think anyone will come close to Phelps in the 200 Free? And if so, who?
Lochte is only going to get better, so phelps has to go near or better than the world record to win. That is hard but I think phelps can beat lochte but I dont think that he can beat crocker in the 100 fly because every time phelps beats crocker its because crocker screws up some how. Phelps needs a little luck to get 8 gold medals.
Ian is 3 wins and 3 loses in the rivalry. He had big wins over Phelps in 2003 Barcelona, 2004 Long Beach, and 2005 Montreal. However Phelps got the big win in 2004 Athens to go along with wins at the 2005 World Championship Trials in Indy and the recent 2006 Nationals last August. We, unfortunately did not get to see a race at Pan Pacs. So it will come down to who is swimming better.
The comment above was from the 100 Fly thread before the World Championships. Ian Crocker is 3 wins and 4 loses now which means that Michael Phelps is 4 wins and 3 loses in the big championship races in the last 4 years.
but I dont think that he can beat crocker in the 100 fly because every time phelps beats crocker its because crocker screws up some how.
Of course he can beat him. We've just seen that he can beat him. We've seen with these two, in most cases, it comes down to the finish. Sometimes Crocker has a better finish, sometimes Phelps does. I do think Crocker is the better 100 flyer, but he's also a little more inconsistent.
Also, keep in mind there were a couple guys expected to threaten Phelps in Melbourne who tanked (or, perhaps more politically correct "failed to challenge Phelps"). Namely, Peter VDH in the 200 free and Laszlo Cseh in the IMs. I wouldn't count those guys out yet. Also, the south Africans in the 400 free relay. Was there Athens performance a flash in the pan?
