It’s easy to lose track of major swim meets (less easy to lose swim of major track meets … OK, that’s awful). So many events, so many Americans winning so many medals.
So let’s recap the World Swimming Championships day-by-day, though the first day was counted under last week’s Woly Award recap. Each link goes to one of Nick Zaccardi’s handy recaps at NBC’s Olympic Talk blog. Events with asterisk will be in the video playlist:
– Men’s 400 freestyle: Gold to China’s Sun Yang, bronze to USA’s Connor Yaeger.
– Women’s 400 freestyle: Gold and U.S. record to last week’s Woly winner, Katie Ledecky.
– Women’s 4×100 free relay: USA (Missy Franklin, Natalie Coughlin, Shannon Vreeland, Megan Romano) edges Australia on Romano’s fantastic anchor leg.
– Men’s 4×100 free relay: France comes back to beat USA (Nathan Adrian, Ryan Lochte, Anthony Ervin, Jimmy Feigen).
– Men’s 100 breaststroke: Gold to Australia’s Christian Sprenger; no U.S. medal.
– Women’s 100 butterfly: Gold to Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom; bronze to ailing American Dana Vollmer.
– *Men’s 50 butterfly (non-Olympic event): Brazil’s Cesar Cielo edges U.S. surprise Eugene Godsoe, who takes silver.
– Women’s 200 medley: Gold to Hungary’s Katinka Hosszu; USA’s Caitlin Leverenz 7th.
– Men’s 200 freestyle: France’s Yannick Agnel dominates; USA’s Connor Dwyer silver, Ryan Lochte 4th.
– Women’s 100 backstroke: Missy Franklin’s second gold (first individual). Elizabeth Pelton 4th.
– *Women’s 1,500 freestyle (non-Oly distance): Katie Ledecky’s second gold and a world record of 15:36.53.
– *Men’s 100 backstroke: 1-2 for the USA: Matt Grevers and David Plummer.
– Women’s 100 breaststroke: Gold for Lithuania’s Ruta Meilutyte, who broke the world record in the semifinals. USA’s Jessica Hardy, the former record-holder, takes bronze.
– Men’s 200 butterfly: Gold to South Africa’s Chad le Clos. USA’s Tom Luchsinger 5th.
– *Women’s 200 freestyle: Missy Franklin’s third gold, dethroning Italy’s Federica Pellegrini.
– Men’s 50 breaststroke (non-Oly distance): South Africa’s Cameron van der Burgh gold; no Americans in final.
– Men’s 800 freestyle final (non-Oly distance): Second gold for China’s Sun Yang; surprise silver for USA’s Michael McBroom, with Connor Yaeger fourth.
– *Men’s 200 medley: Ryan Lochte takes his third straight world title in the event.
– *Men’s 100 freestyle: Australia’s James Magnussen avenges Olympic loss by holding off the USA’s Jimmy Feigen and Nathan Adrian.
– Women’s 200 butterfly: Gold for China’s Liu Zige.
– Women’s 50 backstroke (non-Oly distance): 1-2 for China’s Zhao Jing and Fu Yuanhui.
– *Women’s 4×200 freestyle relay: Another huge moment for Katie Ledecky (third gold, led after leadoff leg) and Missy Franklin (fourth gold, rallied to win with anchor leg), joining Shannon Vreeland and Karlee Bispo for the world title.
– *Women’s 100 freestyle: Australia’s Cate Campbell wins, with Missy Franklin just missing the podium.
– *Men’s 200 backstroke: Gold for Ryan Lochte; bronze for Tyler Clary.
– Women’s 200 breaststroke: Gold for Russia’s Yuliya Efimova; bronze for USA’s Micah Lawrence.
– Men’s 200 breaststroke: Gold for Hungary’s Daniel Gyurta; no U.S. swimmers in final.
– *Men’s 4×200 free relay: USA gold, even with Lochte swimming his third event of the night. In order: Connor Dwyer, Lochte, Charlie Houchin and Ricky Berens, who came home with a comfortable margin of victory of more than two seconds. That’s three golds in two days for Lochte.
– Women’s 50 butterfly (non-Oly distance): Gold to Denmark’s Jeanette Ottesen Gray.
– Men’s 50 freestyle: Brazil’s Cesar Cielo does it again, with Nathan Adrian (4th) and Anthony Ervin (6th) missing out.
– *Women’s 200 backstroke: FIFTH gold for Missy Franklin, by nearly two seconds.
– Men’s 100 butterfly: Another gold for South Africa’s Chad le Clos. Ryan Lochte finished 6th — not his best event by far.
– *Women’s 800 freestyle: FOURTH gold for Katie Ledecky, with a world record of 8:13.86 more than two seconds ahead of the pack.
– Men’s 50 backstroke (non-Oly distance): Gold for France’s Camille Lacourt; USA’s Matt Grevers ties for silver. Yes, a tie. That’s two medals for Grevers.
– Women’s 50 breaststroke (non-Oly distance): Let’s run through the chronology – coming into the meet, the USA’s Jessica Hardy had the world record. Then Russia’s Yuliya Efimova broke it here, only to see Lithuania’s Ruta Meilutyte break THAT record. But then Efimova came back to win the final in non-record time, beating Meilutyte and Hardy, though the latter took bronze and equaled her American record. Which used to be the world record. Got it?
– Men’s 400 medley: Gold for Japan’s Daiya Seto, silver for USA’s Chase Kalisz, fourth for USA’s Tyler Clary.
– Women’s 50 freestyle: You know it’s the Netherlands’ Ranomi Kromowidjojo for gold here.
– *Men’s 1,500 freestyle: THIRD gold for China’s Sun Yang. USA’s Connor Jaeger 4th.
– Women’s 400 medley: Medley sweep for Hungary’s Katinka Hosszu; bronze for USA’s Elizabeth Beisel, USA’s Maya DiRado 4th.
– Men’s 4×100 medley: USA wi… nope, disqualified. Same as 2012 Olympics. Ryan Lochte once again denied another medal. France upsets Australia for gold.
– Women’s 4×100 medley: Easy win for the USA and SIXTH gold for Missy Franklin, who led off in backstroke. Then Jessica Hardy on breaststroke, Dana Vollmer butterfly and Megan Romano freestyle.
OVERALL
Another dominating performance for the USA, with some familiar multi-event names (Franklin, Lochte) joined by less-heralded Olympic champions (Grevers), others confirming their Olympic breakthroughs (Ledecky) and some medal-stand newcomers (Lawrence, Plummer, McBroom, Kalisz, Godsoe, Feigen, Dwyer).
If you want the full list of U.S. results, the best compendium is at Wikipedia, which also rounds up disappointing performances for the U.S. water polo teams (men 9th, women 5th), last week’s synchronized swimming, open water and diving action, and the 1-2 finish in women’s high diving for Cesilie Carlton and Ginger Huber.
USA Swimming also wrapped up the swimming portions of the meet.
So who wins the Woly Award?
Ledecky was the meet’s outstanding female swimmer (China’s Sun Yang took the men’s award), but that included an accomplishment for which she won the Woly last week. This week alone, Franklin won six world titles. Can’t top that.
So Missy Franklin wins this week’s Woly Award, given to the top U.S. performer in Olympic sports.
Other events of the week:
WRESTLING: Jordan Burroughs is now 60-0 in international wrestling, winning the Stepan Sargsyan International in Vanadzor, Armenia. Brent Metcalf and Clayton Foster also won their weight classes.
EQUESTRIAN: Richard Spooner, Reed Kessler, McLain Ward and Beezie Madden combined for second place in the FEI Nations Cup of Great Britain.
And we had U.S. championships in ski jumping (seriously – in 88-degree weather), bobsled pushing and shotgun shooting. See TeamUSA.org’s roundup.
The video playlist also includes the U.S. women’s volleyball team’s first loss in ages, some water polo highlights, and some events from the World Games. Enjoy.
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Duresport.com 