Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte set the stage for a blockbuster show in Rio de Janeiro with a scintillating 200m medley duel at the US Olympic swimming trials on Friday.
It was 18-time Olympic gold medalist Phelps who emerged victorious, but he was pushed all the way by the man who has brought out his best for more than a decade.
“We race each other until the last stroke,” Phelps said.
Photo: Rob Schumacher-USA TODAY
Phelps led at every turn on Friday, but Lochte was closing in coming off the final turn into the closing freestyle leg.
They battled stroke-for-stroke before Phelps lunged for the win in 1 minute, 55.91 seconds, with Lochte second in 1 minute, 56.22 seconds — putting them second and third-fastest in the world this year behind the 1 minute, 55.07 seconds of Japan’s Kosuke Hagino.
“It’s kind of crazy how our races usually work,” Phelps said. “They usually do come down to the crunch.”
The two locked arms across the lane rope, both acknowledging later that what they believe was their final race before a US crowd was a bittersweet moment.
“It was definitely really something that I’m going to take to heart,” Lochte said.
Despite the valedictory feel, the race was more important to both swimmers as a springboard to a final showdown on an even bigger stage at the Olympics in Brazil next month.
Phelps has won the 200m medley in three straight Games, with Lochte taking two silvers and a bronze behind him.
“Thank you for sharing that,” Lochte quipped when asked about the stat, but the 11-time Olympic medalist said he had no trouble staying motivated to challenge Phelps.
Between them they have won the past seven global golds dating to the 2003 world championships. Phelps won world gold in 2003, 2005 and 2007, while Lochte has won four world titles starting in 2009.
“That rivalry that we have created between me and Michael is amazing,” said Lochte, who holds the current 200m medley world record of 1 minute, 54 seconds.
“We push each other and that challenge of getting on those blocks and racing against him is a thrill. So I’m definitely looking forward to that again,” he said.
The 200m medley in Rio will not be a match race if Hagino has anything to do with it.
Phelps said he was “100 percent” certain he would have to go faster to get a medal in Rio.
“I think we’re in a good place where we can improve,” he said.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier