Swimming, Diving, Water Polo - Live from the Aquatics Centre!

[Daisy]

Backstroke has more whistles than other events lol

[Irlandesa]

5 minutes ago, galaxygirl76 said:

And that poor lady trying to keep him in his area 🤣

And probably wants him to put on his darn mask.

[selkie]

8 minutes ago, Daisy said:

Backstroke has more whistles than other events lol

I'm kind of glad the worst of the whistling breaststroke coaches seem to have retired from the sport. Every *tweet* single *tweet* time *tweet* their swimmer put head above the water. 

[Chaser]

I still remember jumping up and down on my couch during that 4x100 relay. One of my favorite Olympic memories. 

[SeanC]

Summer will have to wait until she's the ripe old age of 17 for an Olympic medal in the 400 m.

As an aside, Summer's older sister Brooke is also an athlete, in her case aiming to go to the Winter Olympics (she's already been to the Winter Youth Olympics):

 

[scarynikki12]

2 minutes ago, Chaser said:

I still remember jumping up and down on my couch during that 4x100 relay. One of my favorite Olympic memories. 

Still my favorite relay. I love how Dan was Professional Swimming Announcer Man “the United States trying to hang on for second” while Rowdy was increasingly losing his mind “HERE COMES LEZAK!!!!”

That race was a great demonstration of the value of experience because Rowdy clearly let Announcer Muscle Memory kick in to allow him to do his job while going nuts. A less experienced announcer would have straight up forgotten to do the job in favor of excitement. I wouldn’t mind the latter as Rowdy’s enthusiasm makes the races so much fun but his bosses wouldn’t have been happy. 

[Daisy]

this backstroke record for women keeps falling.

Lets go Masse and Ruck! 

[emma675]

4 minutes ago, scarynikki12 said:

Still my favorite relay. I love how Dan was Professional Swimming Announcer Man “the United States trying to hang on for second” while Rowdy was increasingly losing his mind “HERE COMES LEZAK!!!!”

That race was a great demonstration of the value of experience because Rowdy clearly let Announcer Muscle Memory kick in to allow him to do his job while going nuts. A less experienced announcer would have straight up forgotten to do the job in favor of excitement. I wouldn’t mind the latter as Rowdy’s enthusiasm makes the races so much fun but his bosses wouldn’t have been happy. 

One of my favorite Olympic memories ever. I was jumping around my living room and scaring the dog and I've never appreciated Rowdy's enthusiasm more. Everyone supporting the US in the arena and at home just lost their minds, it was incredible.

What is with the kazoo in the audience during the backstroke? 

[Chaser]

3 minutes ago, Daisy said:

this backstroke record for women keeps falling.

These ladies…

[Daisy]

Way to go Kylie!! 
Ruck might not make it. (she doesn't. she was 9th.. ughhh)

This final is gonna be awesome

Edited July 26, 2021 by Daisy

[SeanC]

1 minute ago, Daisy said:

Ruck might not make it. 

She's had so many health problems this past year, unfortunately, she wasn't expected to.

[Daisy]

What a race. holy crap. GO GO GO GO GO GOOOOOO. 

Awww we got sniped by by Australia. 

[AimingforYoko]

Wasn't a nail-biter, but the U.S. got pushed in the 4x100m.

[LexieLily]

I wish they had the number of the lanes superimposed on the lane/screen so we the audience know which lane is which, or something. Some of the camera angles they use make it so difficult to see what swimmers are in the lead.

[selkie]

The camera angles are off in the pool- it's like they don't have the side view running perfectly parallel to the lane lines and it's making it a little hard to judge close races. 

[Daisy]

1 minute ago, LexieLily said:

I wish they had the number of the lanes superimposed on the lane/screen so we the audience know which lane is which, or something. Some of the camera angles they use make it so difficult to see what swimmers are in the lead.

yeah. They had it in Rio (and I think Beijing). i am like i have no idea who is who  until they show the flag in the medal position)

[ferjy]

I got called away. I'll have to catch it later on the app. So Summer came in fourth. Aw, but she has time to come into her own. We're getting a lot of fourths. Just missed it in the men's too, I see.

 

[Irlandesa]

Just now, LexieLily said:

I wish they had the number of the lanes superimposed on the lane/screen so we the audience know which lane is which, or something. Some of the camera angles they use make it so difficult to see what swimmers are in the lead.

Right.  Cover their heads with flags or something.  It's not like we can see their faces. 

Watching Mike talk to Michael Phelps and I'm glad I'm not the only one who had a "oh crap" moment with that final exchange and how it looked, to my naked eye, a bit early.   I was a little nervous awaiting for the official results to be posted and I'm glad they shared the times.

[Daisy]

5 minutes ago, ferjy said:

I got called away. I'll have to catch it later on the app. So Summer came in fourth. Aw, but she has time to come into her own. We're getting a lot of fourths. Just missed it in the men's too, I see.

 

honestly these 4ths make me happy because usually they translate into medals the next olympics. Canada can swim now (laugh)

[LexieLily]

1 minute ago, Irlandesa said:

Right.  Cover their heads with flags or something.  It's not like we can see their faces. 

Or even that line they use when someone is going along pace with or about to break a world record; use one of those lines for the race itself.

[ferjy]

4 minutes ago, LexieLily said:

I wish they had the number of the lanes superimposed on the lane/screen so we the audience know which lane is which, or something. Some of the camera angles they use make it so difficult to see what swimmers are in the lead.

I know. I've followed the Chinese swimmers (also in red) by mistake a few times. lol

 

[Daisy]

2 minutes ago, Irlandesa said:

Right.  Cover their heads with flags or something.  It's not like we can see their faces. 

 

it doesn't help that some countries have the same colour suits (ahem, China + Canada) so i am cheering for this red swimsuit, and then the time splits show up and it's like "Oh i'm cheering for China lol"

[ferjy]

1 minute ago, Daisy said:

it doesn't help that some countries have the same colour suits (ahem, China + Canada) so i am cheering for this red swimsuit, and then the time splits show up and it's like "Oh i'm cheering for China lol"

Jinx. At least with Maggie MacNeil's win, China was second, so cheering for her wasn't that far off. 😄

 

[Irlandesa]

1 minute ago, Daisy said:

it doesn't help that some countries have the same colour suits (ahem, China + Canada) so i am cheering for this red swimsuit, and then the time splits show up and it's like "Oh i'm cheering for China lol"

Or I'm counting lanes from the top down because they said the US are in Lane 2 and 5.  So I count but then they switch angles and I suddenly don't know whether Lane 2 is 2 or if it's 7 and I can't tell which lane is 4 and 5.

[Daisy]

1 minute ago, Irlandesa said:

Or I'm counting lanes from the top down because they said the US are in Lane 2 and 5.  So I count but then they switch angles and I suddenly don't know whether Lane 2 is 2 or if it's 7 and I can't tell which lane is 4 and 5.

that too it's really weird. I usually don't struggle this much with swimming but this time it's like. I dunno who you are so I'm just looking for that flag indicator. 

It looks like swimming is over. it was a great day of swimming :)

1 minute ago, ferjy said:

Jinx. At least with Maggie MacNeil's win, China was second, so cheering for her wasn't that far off. 😄

 

LOL yeah this is true

[selkie]

For anyone who got the sense that Michale Phelps is not a huge Michael Andrew fan, background on Andrew is that he pretty much has the swim parents from hell and when he turned pro at age 14 the parents were talking about

a) Andrew would be better than Phelps

b) in part because Bob Bowman coached Phelps all wrong and Andrew's parents know the one true way by which all swimmers should train (and in a way that came across as evangelizing as vegans or paleo-eating Crossfitters) 

Up until recently, the back channel on Andrew was that he was actually a nice kid despite his cult-like parents (he was both homeschooled and home-coached) but something's changed with that in the past year or two and he seems to be taking more like his parents now. 

 

[emma675]

I'm glad I'm not the only one struggling with lanes and who's in each one. At first, I was like "did my eyes age that much between 2016 and 2021, why can't I figure this out?" Turns out, it's not me, it's NBC, lol.

[Lady Whistleup]

1 minute ago, selkie said:

For anyone who got the sense that Michale Phelps is not a huge Michael Andrew fan, background on Andrew is that he pretty much has the swim parents from hell and when he turned pro at age 14 the parents were talking about

a) Andrew would be better than Phelps

b) in part because Bob Bowman coached Phelps all wrong and Andrew's parents know the one true way by which all swimmers should train (and in a way that came across as evangelizing as vegans or paleo-eating Crossfitters) 

Up until recently, the back channel on Andrew was that he was actually a nice kid despite his cult-like parents (he was both homeschooled and home-coached) but something's changed with that in the past year or two and he seems to be taking more like his parents now. 

 

He's also vocally anti-vax. (Andrews is.) It sounds like Phelps and Andrews are just really different people who don't vibe.

Titmus's coach is ... interesting.

 

[selkie]

Someone over on SwimSwam just compared Titmus' coach to Shane Tusup, Katinka Hossozu's ex-husband and ex-coach and yeah I can see the unfortunate similarity. It's a yellier coaching style than you typically get in the USA at that level.

[Lady Whistleup]

12 minutes ago, selkie said:

Someone over on SwimSwam just compared Titmus' coach to Shane Tusup, Katinka Hossozu's ex-husband and ex-coach and yeah I can see the unfortunate similarity. It's a yellier coaching style than you typically get in the USA at that level.

Omg Katinka's ex-husband gave me such bad vibes.

[emmawoodhouse]

10 minutes ago, Lady Whistleup said:

Omg Katinka's ex-husband gave me such bad vibes.

Yeah, he was a creeper. I'm glad we won't be seeing him this time around.

[selkie]

3 minutes ago, emmawoodhouse said:

Yeah, he was a creeper. I'm glad we won't be seeing him this time around.

He did try to apologize to the Hungarian swimming federation for that screaming fit at the 10 year old girls on the pool deck and get back in their good graces. But as long as Katinka is still swimming he's probably still persona non-grata in Budapest. 

[emmawoodhouse]

2 minutes ago, selkie said:

He did try to apologize to the Hungarian swimming federation for that screaming fit at the 10 year old girls on the pool deck and get back in their good graces. But as long as Katinka is still swimming he's probably still persona non-grata in Budapest. 

Where's Katinka training these days? Anyone?

[selkie]

13 minutes ago, emmawoodhouse said:

Where's Katinka training these days? Anyone?

 

Per NBC, she's self-coaching for Tokyo. She's at the point in her career where no one knows better than she does what works and doesn't work for her. I suspect she's been moving around to wherever the pool access has been good the past year. 

[NUguy514]

Rowdy...dear Rowdy.  I can't tell if he's just watching the races at an odd angle, but he's made two obviously bad observations at the end of two different races.  One was yesterday in the men's 400 free: with about 15 meters to go, he said pretty casually that he thought McLoughlin looked good for gold when Hafnaoui was, on my TV anyway, pretty obviously (and quite wonderfully!) taking the lead.  The other was today during the women's 100 fly (which was an incredible race): again, with about 15 meters to go, he said he thought Huske looked like she'd hang on for gold, and she was clearly fading precipitously.  I yelled at him (like a sane person), "She's fading and not going to medal, you moron!"  And that's exactly what happened.  Such a fabulous race, though!  I love him, but the surest bet you can have is to take any Rowdy prediction ("I've looked at this race every which way, and I just don't see how ___ loses.") and predict the exact opposite (unless, of course, he's talking about Adam Peaty).  Works every time.

That women's 400 free was also terrific.  What a race by Titmus!!  Her coach seems like someone against whom I would file a restraining order, though.

[Danny Franks]

Adam Peaty got the expected gold medal in the 200m breaststroke, but that will probably be the only gold that Great Britain gets in the swimming. The programme has improved considerably in the last few years, but so has everyone else's. Australia, in particular, look much stronger than they have at the last couple of Games.

Tom Daley and Matty Lee added gold in the 10m synchronised diving, which is a case of "finally!" for Daley and "already?" for Lee. I don't know if Daley plans to retire, but this (and maybe another medal in the individual event) would be a great cap to his career.

[katisha]

6 hours ago, Chaser said:

Oh lord that coach LoL

We have a proud tradition of slightly nutty coaches. Lawrie Lawrence springs to mind! 

So, so proud of our 'Arnie'. Talk about a perfectly executed race!

[SeanC]

Boy, this 1500 m swimming looks exhausting.

[blueray]

7 hours ago, Daisy said:

honestly these 4ths make me happy because usually they translate into medals the next olympics. Canada can swim now (laugh)

I was watching a Canada's feed at the time. They seemed really happy with the 4th place finish. Of course they interviewed the out off breath swimmer. She seemed happy with it as well. And I'm okay that we lost to Australia as it was an interesting race. And her coach made me laugh :)

[galaxygirl76]

10 hours ago, Lady Whistleup said:

Omg Katinka's ex-husband gave me such bad vibes.

I'm not gonna lie, I was relieved to hear they split up. He gave me the heebie jeebies. 

[ferjy]

Men's diving on CBC. Nice thing to wake up to. And Tom Daley, no less. He's so beautiful to watch. And I am talking about the diving (mostly).

[ferjy]

7 hours ago, blueray said:

And her coach made me laugh :)

That was funny. You know that's going to become a gif somewhere on the Net.

Edited July 26, 2021 by ferjy

[ferjy]

GBR clinched it.

 

[emmawoodhouse]

Tom Daley and Matty Lee screw China's stated goal of sweeping the diving medals.

They were divine.

[emma675]

2 minutes ago, emmawoodhouse said:

Tom Daley and Matty Lee screw China's stated goal of sweeping the diving medals.

They were divine.

I can't wait to watch it later! I feel like I've watched Tom Daley grow up, he was so young (and baby faced) at his first Olympics. 

[tanyak]

Everything I know about Michael Andrew I’ve pretty much learned from Dan Hicks and Rowdy Gaines over the last few years, and they always seem to be choosing their words very carefully. And it does seem that while the other swimmers are very cordial toward him in interviews, he doesn’t appear to be one of the dudes.

[Lady Whistleup]

33 minutes ago, tanyak said:

Everything I know about Michael Andrew I’ve pretty much learned from Dan Hicks and Rowdy Gaines over the last few years, and they always seem to be choosing their words very carefully. And it does seem that while the other swimmers are very cordial toward him in interviews, he doesn’t appear to be one of the dudes.

There's a lot of articles about Michael Andrew and his anti-vaccination stance.

He also is coached by his parents, and unlike other athletes not part of a swim club or collegiate program.

As I said, it just sounds like he's really different from the rest of the team and thus probably doesn't vibe with them. Also sounds like he has very overbearing, helicopter parents.

[emmawoodhouse]

14 minutes ago, Lady Whistleup said:

There's a lot of articles about Michael Andrew and his anti-vaccination stance.

He also is coached by his parents, and unlike other athletes not part of a swim club or collegiate program.

As I said, it just sounds like he's really different from the rest of the team and thus probably doesn't vibe with them. Also sounds like he has very overbearing, helicopter parents.

His public face is very Jesusy. Nothing wrong with that, but that's how he presents in interviews.

He reminds me of the old football player Todd Marinovich. His father was relentless in his goal to make Todd a QB in the NFL. Todd eventually burned out, got busted for possession of pot, and flamed out of the NFL pretty quickly. 

I wonder how much longer Michael will last before he breaks down?

[choclatechip45]

I read a profile on Michael Andrew and it was not flattering at all. 

[Lady Whistleup]

5 minutes ago, choclatechip45 said:

I read a profile on Michael Andrew and it was not flattering at all. 

This one. Holy mother of lord helicopter parents.

Quote

“People might think we’re crazy,” Tina Andrew, like her husband a native of South Africa, told ESPN in 2015, when Michael was 16. “What we are is very thoughtful.”

Perhaps most notably, Andrew turned pro at age 14, a decision widely criticized across the sport. Andrew was two years younger than Phelps was when Phelps, who had already made an Olympic team and set a world record, made the decision. Among other things, it meant Andrew would not be able to swim collegiately. “Michael doesn’t need to be inundated with sex and drugs and ideas from liberal professors,” Tina Andrew said to ESPN at the time.

Um okay.