We are down to the last 2 days of the meet. I have been pretty busy up to this point. So far I have done the 200 free 3 times total, the 400 IM twice, and the 400 free three times. I have also been drug tested twice. Needless to say, there hasn’t been time for much else. Eating, sleeping and massages take up the remainder of my time.

I have been pleased with my meet so far. In the 200 free prelims I ended up tied for ninth place but didn’t do a swim off because there was no real point in trying to be first alternate over second alternate. Only eight get to swim finals and there wasn’t much chance that one of those guys was going to drop out of finals. I went a best time, maybe because it was my first time doing it short course meters but it was a best time anyway. The second day I had prelims and finals of the 400 IM and 800 free relay. I wound up qualifying second in the 400 IM in prelims and held on to that place at night to win the silver medal. I was pretty excited because I had never medaled at a world championship event before and I dropped 5 seconds off my previous best time. I led off the 800 free relay in the morning and took it sort of easy but was only 2 tenths off my time from prelims of the 200 free. That relay wound up qualifying second and I earned to opportunity to swim it again in finals. Unfortunately our relay didn’t make it to the medal stand but we did set a new American record. We were about a second off the record in prelims so we were pretty certain we could get it in finals. It is just disappointing to not make it to the medal stand as an American relay.

The third day of the meet with the 400 free was my most interesting day of the meet. I was in lane one in the prelim and tied for second in the last heat of the morning. Right after the race, the scoreboard scrolled the results and finals qualifiers. Then I saw that I had tied for eighth and would have to win a swim-off to make it into finals. I had never done a swim-off before so I figured I was undefeated and planned to stay that way. We waited until after the session completed and got up for another 400. It was just me and a Polish swimmer named Pawel. It was a great race. I led the beginning and he made a move on me early and got pretty close, maybe even taking the lead for about a 50. I was ready for him though and picked up the pace a bit. It came down to a sprint at the end of the race and I beat him by a couple tenths at the end. Needless to say, I was a little tired at the end of that one. I prepared the best I could for the finals but I just couldn’t get my legs going when I needed to and finished eighth with my slowest time of the day. I did go a best time in the swim off though and was pretty happy with the day as a whole.

Now I am enjoying a day of rest before my longest race of the meet. Tomorrow night I swim the 1500 in finals. I am looking forward to another race with some fresh, rested legs. I’ll be looking for another best time to make it 100% for the week.

This entry was posted on Saturday, April 12th, 2008 at 7:57 am and is filed under robertmargalis. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.