Even though I received the letter 4 months ago, I am still surprised to be here today. It’s quite humbling. Being an engineer and swimmer are a couple of the defining elements of who I am, so this honor feels like a combination of the two.
Nowhere else can I start than by thanking my parents. Their sacrifices, financially and emotionally, as well as nights, weekends and missed family vacations, are the reason I am standing up here. This honor is theirs more than anyone else. Thank you.
Also, I want to thank Doug Grooms and Mark Mullin. Coach Grooms doggedness in recruiting me was a key factor in landing here. With a limited budget, he maximizes the resources available and maintains a nationally ranked team year after year. During my time at UMR, Mark was head of the NCAA swim committee and kept swimming a priority at the Division 2 level. Student-athletes continue to benefit from his commitment to the sport and NCAA Interscholastic athletics in general.
I did not expect him to be here today, but I feel it also important to thank Keith Bailey. His continued financial support of the university has made this experience possible for countless students, including me. Along with a group of students, I was fortunate to meet him during my time in Rolla. He shared with us a story of accepting new challenges. My takeaway from that encounter is to embrace the new and unknown. In this era, many challenges we tackle are unprecedented, there are no right or wrong answers, we need to try, fail quickly, learn, and keep pushing forward.
I am also grateful for my teammates and those I was fortunate to help coach and recruit while I was here. Reflecting on the other swimmers that have preceded me in Hall of Fame induction, and those I expect are upcoming, it is hard for me to see how I measure up to the heights of their athletic accomplishments. Since finding out about this honor, I have reflected on how I got here and why I may have been selected.
That doesn’t mean that the goals we have don’t count. They do, mostly because they cause us to go through the process, and it’s the process that makes us wise, happy, or whatever. If we do things in the wrong sort of way, it makes use miserable, angry, confused, and things like that. The goal has to be right for us, and it has to be beneficial, in order to ensure a beneficial process. But aside from that, it’s really the process that’s important. Enjoyment of the process is the secret that erases the myths of the Great Reward…Perhaps this can help to explain the everyday significance of…the Way.
During my time in Rolla, whether I was a student, athlete, teammate, researcher or assistant coach, I embraced and enjoyed the process. I hope that embracing the process is the legacy I left. The experience in Rolla and embracing the process has had an immeasurable influence on my life, for which I am forever grateful.
It is a rare occasion to see swimming highlights on Sportscenter, but a few days ago that happened. Caeleb Dressel has been on an absolute tear this week at NCAA Championships, shredding his own 50 Free American and US Open record, lowering it to an unbelievable 17.63. In the post Michael Phelps era, it is great to see swimming highlights transcend the sports landscape. In the context of swimming, how fast are his record-breaking swims? Are they unprecedented?
There are technique and technology advances that have shifted swimming over time. Technology includes water filtration, lanelines, blocks, and air filtration, as well as lower friction materials for suit, goggle and cap design, as well as the availability of video for biomechanic analysis. Considering the last 40 years, there has also been the innovation of the backstroke flip turn, emphasis on underwater kicking, and dolphin kick on breaststroke breakouts. Freestyle has had the least changes in the timeframe noted, so for comparison, I considered the record progression of the 50 Free, 100 Free, and 200 Free. Additionally, the 400 IM was also considered. The starting point for analyzing each of these events is what I considered a monumental record time as the starting point. What was a monumental swim? A record that lasted more than 10 years. Doing this analysis the datapoints for the 200 free were consistent between Matt Biondi and Rowdy Gaines, so I used the old one (1981 instead of 1987). The time when that record was broken was used to trend the future progression of the record, and a +/- 1% projection is shown in the charts, to illustrate a range that would be reasonable for the record swim to land.
The following records were selected for use in the analysis:
400 IM, Tom Dolan, 3:38.18, 1995
200 Free, Rowdy Gaines, 1:33.91, 1981
100 Free, Matt Biondi, 41.80, 1987
50 Free, Tom Jager, 19.05, 1990
I am partial to Tom Dolan’s 400 IM Record swim, for a few reasons. His performances in the 1995 NCAA Season, setting American records in the 400 IM, 500 Free and 1650 Free, all of which stood for roughly a decade, and led the University of Michigan to a National Championship, is unprecedented in the last 30 years for a team that was not sprint focused. Additionally, those swims were a lead-up to back to back 400 IM Olympic Gold Medals in Atlanta and Sydney.
In 2009 Tyler Clary significantly dropped the 400 IM record, by over two seconds, and eight years later Chase Kalisz dropped the record another 2.5 seconds with his swim at NCAA Championships. Looking at that progression over the course of 22 years, the improvement is in an expected range. Interestingly, the time improvements seem to be in a reasonable range, comparing to previous milestones of the 400 IM.
Similarly, looking at Rowdy Gaines 200 Free Record swim in 1981 and the amount it was broken by Matt Biondi 6 years later, there was some incremental improvements to that record, but it was not until Simon Burnett’s swim of 1:31.20 in 2006 that the record was really pushed forward significantly. Even so, considering that time progression, the record by Blake Pieroni and subsequently Townley Haas at the 2018 NCAA Championships, this record seems to be within an expected range. It is cool that the 1:30 barrier was broken, but based on how the record has progressed over the last 40 years, it looks like it was about time for this to happen.
It gets a little more interesting when looking at the 100 Free. Matt Biondi’s 41.80 record swim from 1987 was tied by Anthony Ervin in the early 2001 and broke it in 2002, but the record was not lowered, significantly, until the supersuit year of 2009 by Caesar Cielo. Projecting that record forward, Dressel’s 39.90 is slightly faster than we would anticipate. Admittedly, Caeleb said he was tired in the 100 free swim on the last day of NCAA Championships. Considering what he did in the 50 Free and 100 fly, we can only speculate where he could have taken this record, which may be well outside the expected record progression range.
On the other hand, Dressel’s 50 Free this year, or his swim from each of the last 3 NCAA Champsionships for that matter, is without comparison. Tom Jager’s 19.05 was a historic swim, a record that stood for 15 years, until Fred Bousquet became the first one to break 19 seconds. As an 18-second 50 Free has become more common, the question arises on how fast is possible. Dressel’s 17.63 is half a second faster than his previous best, from 2017 and further separates him from history in this event. On top of winning the event by a full second (1.01 to be exact), in a historical context, his swim is unprecedented.
How is this possible? I point to a couple reasons: anaerobic performance and momentum. In the other events, aerobic performance, and cardiovascular conditioning dominate. The aerobic ability of these swimmers is going to be relatively even, considering they are all elite athletes that train at a high level. Over time, technology combined with these physiological characteristics and physical abilities will drive the incremental improvements in maximum performance, which in this case, our measure is the US Open record in these four events. For that reason, the 100 free and longer events appear relatively consistent from a historical trend.
In the 50 free, on the other hand, the aerobic requirement is minimal, because the majority of the race is anaerobic, dependent on fast twitch muscles, so it introduces a much different physiology. Plus, the start is a significant portion of the race, ie, jumping, a relatively non-swimmer skill. As a result of the start, when the swimmer hits that water is the point of greatest momentum. On top of excellent technique and feel for the water, Caeleb Dressel has an athletic ability to jump, and his entry maintains that momentum to such a greater extent than others. It is not an exaggeration to say that he performs this at a level which we have never seen.
Difference between first and second 25s (seconds)
His split differential from first to second 25 is in the middle of the range of swimmers in that final (0.67 vs a median of 0.69), which is a bit surprising because he had clean water on the second 25 which would put him in better position to be faster than those swimming in the outside lanes. That lends more support to the idea that his aerobic abilities are not exceptional. From his entry in the water, he is at a higher momentum and through his technique he maintains that speed, while having a traditional drop off from the first to second 50.
What do you think? Are there other monumental records that I missed? And how about Caeleb Dressel being down to earth?
