Phelps Gives Himself a Chance to Top Spitz

小臭贝

OMAHA — There stood Ian Crocker, his 6-foot-5 frame retreating into the pleated folds of a curtain separating the interview area from the warm-down pool. As usual, he was waiting for Michael Phelps to relinquish the spotlight.

The big events always seem to cast Crocker in Phelps’s shadow, and it was no different Saturday night at the United States Olympic swimming trials.

The 25-year-old Crocker is the world-record holder in the 100-meter butterfly, but Phelps has dominated their rivalry, winning 12 of the 16 meetings since 2002. Gunning for an eighth Olympic berth in seven days, Phelps ran his consecutive victory streak against Crocker to four by winning the final of the 100 fly with a time of 50.89 seconds. Crocker finished in 51.62.

Crocker’s three-year-old world record, 50.40, was safer than a pedestrian here after dark. Phelps was too tired to give chase and Crocker was too uptight. “This whole week has been interesting, an eye-opener,” Crocker said. “I’m just really thankful to be on my way to Beijing instead of being on my couch to watch the Games.”

The couch is where Gary Hall Jr. will be watching the 2008 Olympics. The two-time defending gold medalist in the 50 freestyle, Hall finished fourth in the final of the event, missing a spot on his fourth Olympic team by 0.26 seconds. Garrett Weber-Gale was fastest to the wall, breaking Cullen Jones’s day-old American record with a time of 21.47. Jones finished third at 21.81, behind Ben Wildman-Tobriner.

Crocker has a low-grade ego but he was not being self-deprecating when he expressed his thanks for making his third Olympic team. It had been a stressful week. On Wednesday, in the preliminaries of the 100 freestyle, an event in which he qualified for the 2004 Athens Olympics, Crocker was disqualified for a false start. The next evening, he saw his Texas Aquatics teammate, Brendan Hansen, fail to make the Olympic team in the 200 breaststroke despite having held the world record in the event until last month.

“It had my heart rate up in the last couple of days,” Crocker said. “It’s been hard to sleep.”

Mark Spitz, who won the 100 butterfly in 1972 on his way to seven Olympic gold medals, said he believed Phelps would win eight gold medals in Beijing. The 100 butterfly, because it is the shortest race on Phelps’s schedule, could give him the most fits. But Spitz says he likes Phelps’s chances because of his success against Crocker.

It has to be a “little demoralizing” to keep losing close races to Phelps, Spitz said. “And to think that things could change four weeks from now is unlikely, and I would think that is what Michael is thinking also.”

All is not necessarily lost. Crocker can look back to the days of Spitz and take heart. At the 1968 trials, Douglas Russell lost to Spitz in the 100 fly. It was one of nine consecutive defeats Spitz handed Russell, but he got revenge at the Mexico City Games, beating Spitz for the gold medal.

Crocker, who was sick during the Athens Games and was touched out by Phelps for the gold in the 100 butterfly by 0.04 seconds, vowed to get faster in the month before Beijing. So did Phelps, who seemed disgusted by his finish Saturday. He misjudged the wall and did not hit the timing pad with a full stroke. “There are a few little things that I can work on between now and the Olympics,” Phelps said.

Phelps, 23, qualified for Beijing, his third Olympics, in five individual events — the 100 and 200 butterfly, the 200 and 400 individual medley and the 200 freestyle. He is also eligible to swim three relays: the 4x100 freestyle, 4x100 medley and 4x200 freestyle.

“I had a pretty decent week,” said Phelps, who set world records in the individual medleys. “I’m excited. I’m ready for the challenge that lies ahead of me.”

Crocker and Phelps have joint custody of the 100 butterfly, accounting for the 10 fastest swims in the event. That would explain their long faces after Saturday’s race.

“He’s been going for that world record for a long time and so have I,” Crocker said. “When you’re a half a second off of it, it’s kind of a pain in the butt.”

With every stroke they take, Crocker and Phelps are pulling their fellow Americans along in their slipstream. The eighth-fastest time in the final, Davis Tarwater’s 52.83, would have placed third at the 2004 trials.

“I feel like there are a lot of young wolves coming to eat the old wolves,” Crocker said. After the race, he swam over to Lane 3 to embrace the third-place finisher, Gil Stovall, who will swim the 200 butterfly in Beijing.

“He told me that I’m the future of American swimming,” Stovall said. “It was kind of a shock. I almost started crying.”