Epic Failure

Medi Harris has swum the 4x1 at the Worlds before (2022). She's the obvious backup in those 30. Last year they used the 4 you mention in both heat/final. As they did in Tokyo.

Fair play to Joe Litchfield. It's not his fault that everyone else underperformed. He's improved his PB by almost a second today. He showed up when others didn't. I wouldn't be doing anything to risk him underperforming in Paris by making him chase a time. If that means Peters doesn't get to go, so be it. Honestly, the only way I would be taking Peters now is if Guy qualifies in the 200m free as one of the 4 relay slots. If Jimmy doesn't qualify that way, I'd still be taking him as cover for the various relays - he's the only swimmer who can cover all 3 relays who isn't already on the team.

I should clarify that I meant they aren't that close at this exact moment in time. As you say, the other events that are going to happen will start making the picture much clearer. For example, if Osrin wins the 200m back in the BNT, that likely makes a decision more difficult for someone like Cox. Basically the putative relay swimmers want the usual suspects to win everything!

Yeah, Andy Jamieson was almost having a fainting fit on comms when he realised that he was doing that double in one session.

There's a bunch of other people who are vying for that spot and it's likely to depend on results in the 50m and 200m, along with other events given the cap British Swimming has imposed. So Whittle, whilst being a strong contender if they do want to take some specific relay cover, isn't as close right now as some others mentioned might be (for what it is worth, I don't think Cox is quite as close either)

My gut is that they will put team goals ahead of individual goals. That's generally been the focus. They clearly encouraged Jimmy to sacrifice his individual goals for the relays in Tokyo. And they've left people out of Worlds teams who have been medal threats in 50s because they aren't useful in Olympics. However, my gut is regularly wrong. And Eva is right at the start of her career as a senior. So they might well prefer her to get more experience of high level comps. That would be a persuasive argument to me. But then I'm an idiot.

She doesn't always swim it but she has a PB from the 2021 trials which is quicker that Osrin's best from earlier this year. Obviously not a guarantee but after her form in the 100m, I'm loathe to rule out the possibility.

Not sure whether I'm sane :D I'd have thought something like Mare Nostrum would be more likely if they really wanted her to target that individual spot. Slightly further removed from the Olympics themselves. Honestly though, I don't think they would be pushing her to do it. Barring a huge drop she wouldn't be a finalist in either distance. So her biggest upside right now is the relay. Doubtful they would encourage something that might put that in jeopardy.

Don't think the 200IM is definitely a sure thing for Dean/Scott as a pair. Max Litchfield is obviously on form and is only half a second back of Dean on PBs. Obviously it wouldn't change the make up of the team anyway as all 3 are on the train. Likewise, Dawson could challenge Osrin for that back spot.

It's possible. But he's only =7th seed for that. So he probably requires a couple of those in front of him to have a pretty awful day and then also perform well himself, whilst hoping that none of those around him have a good swim (which includes the likes of Max Litchfield and Kieran Bird, so not exactly implausible that they swim well either).

200 free.

Burras has historically not always been great on relays either, so you feel he really needed to deliver here to be sure of his place. He's seeded #2 for the 50 but even his time-trial tonight was not super impressive. Right now there's probably 4/5 people who fancy their chances of being ahead of him, all of whom could be in that relay as well. And obviously I'm discounting Proud, who you imagine will be miles ahead of everyone, but won't be on the relay unless there's a weird sickness bug the week of the Games!

I think Jacob is probably at risk, especially considering that the 4x1 is on day 1, when you expect everyone to be fresh. I think if someone like Painter or Cumberlidge were to get the 2nd 50 spot, Whittle might be missing out.

Depends on how expected you think. The only one that has probably exceeded expectations thus far has been Bird. Dean was fine tonight but nothing special. Others (Brooker, Adam, Williams, Mildred etc) have been outperformed by others. Very few of the Bath swimmers have matched their seedings thus far.

In other news, the Bath PC team have had a pretty awful meet thus far. Not sure they've got any individual qualifiers at the moment. Sounds obvious but I think what happens in the 50/200 will greatly impact who goes in the relay as back up. You would presume that Jimmy Guy will be under consideration as well as those in the final tonight.

The 4 tonight were quicker than the respective top 4 at trials last year by about 0.4 seconds collectively (and each swimmer was faster than their respective finisher last year), so I'm not sure you can use that race to write off their chances of a medal.

From memory (ie don't quote me on this!), I think they usually do a bunch of work on the relay takeovers at the training camp directly ahead of the champs. I'm not sure whether they do as much during normal training, with different people being in different camps and with things like tapering being an issue.

Lewis Burras just warming up for the 50m there.

Yeah, somewhere around 4.09 is getting towards the minor medals. Obviously, gold is likely staying in France!

I think we can reasonably expect her to make the final and then who knows? But it's worth noting that both Grimes and Summer are younger than her, so in theory they should also be expected to drop time! And Forrester is only a few months older. Don't get me wrong, Freya is a great talent. Just think we should temper our expectations slightly. A new British record for Max Litchfield!

It could be worse, he was doing the interviews in Doha and the poor foreign athletes had to deal with his sometimes poorly worded questions in a second language!

She's still got to drop another couple of seconds to match the podium from last year. But she's definitely trending in the right direction.

Jimmy's scratching the 100m Free final tonight, which does suggest that he's even more focused on the fly and 200m free than ever. He's obviously a superstar for what he's done for GBR over the years already - his reaction to the gold in Tokyo is hands down one of my favourite GB Olympic moments of all time - but I'm not convinced that unless he's become Caleb Dressel overnight that it will get us atop the podium. If everyone swims to their potential, Xu and Pan are better than Morgan/Richards. Qin hasn't yet beaten Peaty at his best but he's on the rise and Peaty is not yet back to his absolute imperious best. I'm not going to call that one either way right now. So Jimmy would have to absolutely clobber them in the fly. I think he can beat them, but I'm not sure by enough. The US is the same - Armstrong or Murphy are both ahead of Morgan. Peaty ahead of Fink and the freestyle probably a tie. Dare Rose is probably a match at least for Jimmy. The great unknown there is Dressel obviously. Obviously, there's a bunch of things that could change - an injury for any of the teams could change things drastically. And form is never a guarantee, not to mention the constant risk of DQs. GBR is absolutely capable of standing atop the podium. But it isn't something I'd be putting money on right now. However, we've definitely looked closer as a result of this week than we did even a month ago!

Yeah, I'd have the US and China currently dueling out for gold with GBR currently heading the pack for bronze. There's obviously lots that could change before the sumemr but that's where I'd put my money if I were a betting man right now.

I think there was just a problem with the graphic on the stream. According to the live results, she's part of a 3-way tie for 6th on 25.87. So she'll be in the A final no matter what if those results are correct. edit - confirmed by the pdf for the official results just posted now. She's in.