Is Tokyo the Olympics where USA’s swimming empire crumbles?
Success at Olympic trials is an invitation to look ahead, but the new star of American men’s swimming sounded nostalgic when he confirmed his trip to Tokyo.
Caeleb Dressel may well win gold in three individual events in Japan, but he reflected on what the US team has lost as well as what the coming days may bring.
Ryan Lochte, Matt Grevers and Nathan Adrian, with 15 Olympic golds between them, failed to qualify for Tokyo. Then there is – or rather, isn’t – the now-retired Michael Phelps, who picked up five of his career 23 Olympic titles in Rio five years ago.
“To be honest I’m not ready for a team without Nathan. I told him that. What he brings to the team, all those guys, big guys, literally all of them are pretty big guys. What they bring, their impact, what they present to the team is huge,” Dressel said at the US trials last month.
“They left behind some really big shoes to fill. I’m not ready for them, and I have to be. It doesn’t just fall on my shoulders. I think everyone who is on the team, we’re going to have to pick up the pace, because what they left behind is huge from all of them.”
Lochte’s misadventures at a Brazilian gas station and the resulting hullabaloo distracted from the US team’s successes in 2016. The US claimed 33 medals, including 16 golds out of an available 35. Australia were a distant second in the standings, with 10 medals, three of them gold.
It was a similar tale at London 2012, with 31 American medals (16 golds), far ahead of the runners-up, China (10 medals, five golds). Nor was the pattern much different in Beijing in 2008. As for 2004 and 2000? See above.
So, can they do it again? Return home with roughly a third of the medals and half the golds? With the two 24-year-olds, Dressel and Katie Ledecky, leading the charge, and the American relay teams likely to be formidable, it’s clearly possible. The question is not whether the Americans will dominate the podium, but to what degree.
Indeed, the build-up this week has centered as much on an internal division as on the threat posed by the opposition. The disclosure by multiple medal contender Michael Andrew that he is unvaccinated sparked a roiling debate on social media between past and present team members – an unusual moment of minor turbulence so close to a major competition.
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Dressel won two relay titles in Rio in 2016 then grabbed the spotlight in the 2017 and 2019 world championships, winning seven medals in the former and eight in the latter and setting a world record as he won the 100m butterfly. He’ll also compete individually in Tokyo in the 50m and 100m freestyle.
Ledecky won the 800m freestyle in 2012 and 2016, taking freestyle golds in Rio in the 200m, 400m and 4x200m and adding silver in the 4x100m. She’s the prohibitive favourite to win the 1500m, which is new to the women’s slate for Tokyo.
The meet began on Saturday on a tailwind of promise: six medals, including Chase Kalitz’s gold in the 400m individual medley. But while the US exude self-assurance, the Australian contingent sounds bullish. “I think the Olympics are not going to be all America’s way,” the 20-year-old Tasmanian, Ariarne Titmus, said last month.
“The Americans and Katie Ledecky definitely have their work cut out for them. I think they have real competition this time round and I think it’s going to be very interesting,” said Brett Hawke, who swam for Australia at the 2000 and 2004 Olympics and is now a coach in the US. He cited Australia’s strength in the women’s 4x100m relay, in which the country is going for a third successive gold, and the rise of Titmus, who is competing in her first Games aged 20.
Titmus overcame an unwell Ledecky to win the 400m freestyle at the 2019 world championships and delivered another statement of intent at the Australian trials in June, swimming the distance in 3:56.90. That is less than half-a-second slower than Ledecky’s world record, and more than four seconds quicker than the time the American posted in the US trials.
Australian optimism is understandable, though they also looked to be emerging as a force capable of mounting a sustained challenge to American supremacy in the early 2000s, only to underwhelm in the end. The two nations even duked it out in made-for-television battles in 2003, 2005 and 2007 called the Duel in the Pool. The hyped-up rivalry proved almost as strained as the rhyme in the title. A team of elite Europeans was sourced as fresh opposition from 2009 to 2015, but fared no better. The US will be hoping it’s the same story in Tokyo. The coming days should be interesting.
