At the Trials!

I'm sure they were. I bet Peter Vanderkaay was a little stunned himself. In an interview for floswimming only about a month or two ago he flat out said he wasn't even going to swim the 1500 at Trials! And based on how Vendt has been swimming who would have thought he'd finish fourth? That's as stunning to me as Hansen fading in the 200 ***. Too bad there's not a way of dealing with this for Vendt, having (I think) the second fastest swim in the world this year. I also feel badly for Haley Mcgregory. How can we not have a world-record breaker on the team? There certainly are spaces available since only 43 members were selected. Of course, what would she swim?

I love this thread. Read it through twice! How about some non-swimming Trials experiences? Were concessions good? What was the crowd like? What color T-shirt did you get? How did you fill non-swimming time? Did you get any autographs? Who'd you see in person? What was for sale in the aqua-what's-it-called? Trading cards? Details, please! And.....next Trials, what would you have done differently/the same? My sister gave me all the details of her trip. Bottom line - she had such a great time she wants to go for the entire event next Trials! Hmmm, let's see Michelle. Well, I was a bit surprised that Speedo was the ONLY shop in the Aquazone. Grace & I shopped there but she wears TYR goggles and couldn't score a set. I also use Keifer optical goggles and there were none even though this was run by Keifer. There were no bargain prices anywhere. No grab bags, no fire sales, nada. They also seemed to have way underestimated how many of the Trials logo-specific T and sweat shirts they would sell. They re-supplied several times but many people still went away empty handed. We got a couple of the good ones on third supply just by being there when the boxes were opened. The crowds were unbelievable, averaging about 20,000 per day and topping out at around 13,700 for one evening session. The poorest attended evening session was on the last day. But, at that point, they passed 160,000 total attendance, a number that was reported in the local papers as the goal attendance and well ahead of previous Trials. As for non-swimming time, we trained at the Council Bluffs Y three times and at the Pinnacle Athletic Club once (swimming and weight lifting). The rest of the time we spent doing a lot of walking (one day over 7 miles) along the Missouri River path and downtown. The old section of downtown was about a 15 minute walk away and we ate in some nice restaurants (one Persian, one Indian and the Upstream Brewery) and sampled some great locally-made ice cream at Ted and Wallys (coincidentally, the names of two of our cats - one recently departed). The Upstream Brewery definitely brews good beer. It looked like there were a number of other restaurants that were worth trying but we just didn't have the time. On a couple of days we ate lunch at the concessions which were pretty good. One served Omaha Steaks cheeseburgers and another served up his own smoked meats. We spent quite a bit of time at the AquaZone but didn't try for any autographs. I did come into hand contact with Gary Hall Sr who was passing out Race Club info. Long lines for autographs and really tired parents trying to keep their kids happy. Several times the lines were so long that some in the queue didn't come away with anything. The swimmers were all pleasant and tireless in this effort. On one day we saw a bunch of teenies hanging around the swimmers entrance. In walks Phelps, slouched over and pretty well covered (we didn't know who it was) but they spotted him right away and snagged an autograph. I can't think of anything we'd do differently if we come back. Maybe just spend more time downtown rather than driving in and out of the parking lots between sessions. We were both in the blue section on July 4 and came away with blue T shirts. Omaha seems like a really nice city with a local population that loves to support amateur athletics. One night a couple came in who didn't know anything about swimming but just came because it was there. They asked us who they should be cheering for and quickly got into the spirit of things. I'm one of those who thinks this might be a good permanent venue for the Trials. Lot's of hotels, not too many time zones to cross, plenty of restaurants nearby and interested locals.

How about some non-swimming Trials experiences? Were concessions good? What was the crowd like? What color T-shirt did you get? How did you fill non-swimming time? Did you get any autographs? Who'd you see in person? What was for sale in the aqua-what's-it-called? Trading cards? Details, please! And.....next Trials, what would you have done differently/the same? My sister gave me all the details of her trip. Bottom line - she had such a great time she wants to go for the entire event next Trials! The Qwest Center is a new arena, so it has lots of concession stands and lots of bathrooms. I never had to wait in line for anything for more than 1 or 2 minutes, tops. Their concession stands weren't bad. They had the usual arena-run stands, but they also had some that were run by local restaurants. One was a Greek restaurant that had good gyros. The July 4th T-shirts and flags were a nice touch. As we entered the arena they handed us our flags and told us that our shirts would be on the backs of our seats. I sat in a "red" section. We figured out after the first day that it wasn't worth leaving the area between the prelims and finals. Because there were so many restaurants within walking distance, we just walked over, found a restaurant, and had a nice meal. We also found the awesome homemade ice cream place. As Mel said, they really missed out on the opportunity to sell a LOT more merchandise. Kiefer had a stand in the arena itself (not the AquaZone) where they were selling T-shirts. But they ran out of the good T-shirts (the short-sleeved red ones) by mid-week and we never saw any more. They missed out on probably three full days of what could have been good sales, especially because a lot of people attended only on the 3-day holiday weekend. Friday night was our "celebrity spotting" night. We were in an Italian restaurant after the finals session. In walked Bob Costas with a female companion (we assumed it was his wife). They were seated in a corner near us. Pretty soon a large group, including Ryan Lochte's dad, came in and sat at a big table. Not long after that, Michael Phelps's mother came in with another large group. They were seated at a large table near the Lochte table. After a while, in walked Ryan Lochte himself. He was still wearing the same clothes he had worn on the medal stand, but now he had a band-aid on his arm where they had taken blood. Everyone in the restaurant burst out in applause. Ryan looked a little shocked by that!

The only other comment I can think of is it was either Visa or cash at the concessions....I understand that this was sponsored by Visa....but I heard quite a few people grumbling about that. My son and I were there the first day, prelims and finals.....and I couldn't believe that 2 of the stands were already running out of certain shirts. We were in line making fun of the marketing person that messed that up...there were people walking away disappointed because they couldn't get the shirt they wanted. The swimming was phenominal that first day!!!!!!! I will definitely go again given the chance!!!!

On a couple of the broadcasts I noticed a lot of people wearing TYR shirts in the seating area directly behind the blocks. Nice marketing strategy by Tyr considering we were otherwise deluged by Speedo logos on 90% of the swimmers.