Michael Phelps is the greatest swimmer ever born… and the 2008 Olympics haven’t even arrived. Tiger Woods can be beaten, Federer can as well (and even has a nemesis in Nadal), but Phelps is the metaphorical mile ahead of everybody. Watch him win 8 or 9 gold medals next year.

He won only 6 gold medals in the last Olympics, but salvaged his reputation with a mindblowing performance at the 2007 Melbourne world championships in March (keep a close eye on all the red lines in the video, and remember that nobody else in the world, all 100 billion human beings who have ever lived, had ever crossed the line he consistently swam two bodylengths in front of.)

The 2007 US National championships were held in Indianapolis early this month. This event is considered the warm up for the 2008 US trials for Beijing, and Michael Phelps came to the city with a full head of hair and an ugly French beard (which he thankfully shaved off a couple of days into the competition.) He was known to be on a light training schedule at the time: he supposedly was swimming only three times a week, and considering the average number of swims per week during peak training season is about ten, it gives you an idea of how important he considered this competition.

Phelps swam only the events he had no intention of swimming in the Olympics. In the 200 Breaststroke, he came in in a lowly third place… in the B Final. He then dived in for the 200 Backstroke and took it easy, to end up behind Ryan Lochte and the formerly unbeatable Aaron Peirsol. A gold in the 200m Freestyle with the second fastest time in history only meant he was over a second slower than his world record.

He then reeled off an almost-world record in the 200m Backstroke (an event he will not swim at the Olympics.) A quick dive in for the 100 Butterfly (the only ’strength’ event he couldn’t dominate Crocker over… until 2007 arrived), and he won it but without the American or world record. (Ian Crocker pulled off another disqualification in this event after that controversial early dive he pulled off early in the year. The story goes that in Melbourne, after Phelps whipped Crocker in Crocker’s pet event, the 100m Butterfly, Crocker replied by diving off the blocks a tad early (0.61s, to be precise) in the 4×100m Medley relay qualifiers, thus pulling off a DQ for Team USA and thus denying Phelps a record-breaking 8th gold medal at the world championships.)

The 100 backstroke was all Phelps magic, though. He never swims this event since he’s got better things to do, but decided to tread on Peirsol’s and Lochte’s feet for kicks. He whipped off his iPod, dived in, ended the 50m in second place, turned and… finished 0.03s off the world record, with enough energy left to glance at the electronic timing board and then scream in frustration about what might have been. Two days later, he decided to lead off the 4×100m Medley relay time trials for the Wolverines in another highly anticipated bid to break the world record in the last event of the championships, but in spite of timing under WR pace over 50m, he ended with a slow 53.17, almost 0.2s off Peirsol’s record. (Yes, the individual world record counts if set in the first leg of a relay.)

A few other fantastic American swimmers also have to be written about. Dara Torres, a 40 year old former 50m Freestyle world record holder, just came back from retirement (and childbirth) to easily dominate the 50m Freestyle and 100m Freestyle at the Indy championships: the shorter event with a new American record to boot. To put things in perspective, she was 17 when she first swam for the USA in the 1984 Olympics. There are whispers about her being “on the juice”, though…

Erik Vendt, Phelps’ Club Wolverine teammate, is another person to look out for: like Janet Evans, he is physically tiny but really pulls his weight in the long distance events. He used to concentrate on the 400 IM, but sensibly switched to the 1500 Freestyle after coming out of retirement because of the appearance of The Lochte. He dominated the 800m and 1500m Freestyle events over Larsen Jensen and Peter Vanderkaay at Indianapolis, and should be worth rooting for in 2008.

Of course, to every Federer there is a Nadal who would be the best in the world… but for the other guy. In this case, the guy’s name is Ryan Lochte. This man consistently clocks world records only to find that Phelps got there first, two seconds before he did. He is going to win 4 gold medals in Beijing: two relays and the two backstroke events as well as a ton of silver medals… and maybe, just maybe, might pull off a victory over Phelps in one of the IMs.

The 2007 US nationals can be viewed online, legally and for free, here. Timed Finals is also a great collaborative blog on swimming, similar to this one. There’s also quite a nice blog about Indian swimming here.

What is common to the following adjectives?

Graceful, Elegant, Stylish…

Rather, which class of cricketers do words such as the above remind you of? I would be very surprised if you would answer anything other than left hand batsmen.

I have always wondered what it is that makes the left hand batsman more stylish than his right handed counterpart. Apart from the odd guy like Dravid, or maybe Laxman, I haven’t seen too many right handed batsmen being described thus. At least the general class of right handed batsmen is not described in such terms, while it is oft used to describe the lefties. Quite intriguing. Aren’t southpaws just a mirror image of right handers? Aren’t they just doing the same thing, but with their dominant hand dominant?

Actually, not quite, I think. Maybe it would be useful to look at the lefties who are most often described as ‘elegant’, etc. Some names that immediately come to mind are Lara, Ganguly, Gower, Stephen Fleming and Graeme Pollock (ok the list is not exhaustive. Feel free to add to this.) And the common thread that runs across them is that they are all natural right handers who bat left handed! At least, all of them bowl/throw right handed leading us to believe that is their dominant hand.

Have you ever heard anyone describe Yuvraj or Jayasuriya elegant? I’m not even sure if too many people have described Border (another natural left hander) as elegant.

You must have guessed by now, the point I’m trying to make is that the elegance comes in batting with the weaker hand. A natural right hander batting left handed means that the dominant hand is the top hand. Which is where you get all the delicate touches, and angles, and elegance from.

Of course there are exceptions. Border (a natural left hander) is also described as “elegant”, as are Laxman and Dravid (natural right handers who bat right handed). And then you have people like Hayden and Gayle, who though bat with a dominant top hand, are very brute force.

And does the opposite apply? What about natural left handers batting right handed? Ravi Shastri is supposed to have been elegant, though by the time I started watching, he was synonymous with excruciatingly slow batting. Michael Clarke does look quite elegant. And of course there’s Sachin (though i’m not sure if he’s a left hander who plays cricket right handed or a right hander who writes lefthanded).

Any thoughts?

Technorati Tags: left hand batsmen, Lara, Ganguly, Gower, Stephen Fleming, Graeme Pollock, Yuvraj, Jayasuriya, Border

I wrote this a few hours after two of the most shocking upsets in World Cup history. Both India and Pakistan have lost. India still have some hope, with that big win against Bermuda and a game in hand. Pakistan, however, have no such hope. Having already lost to the West Indies, they are out of the world cup.

The Format

When the organizing committee of the Cricket World Cup (CWC2007) came up with the present format, it was hailed by one and all. “We give a chance to the minnows, polish them off and have a proper world cup in the 92 format among the 8 major teams”, they said. Most people nodded. One thing, however, that people didn’t reckon was about the impact of an upset.

The pair of Saturday’s upsets has created havoc in the world cup schedule. Ireland are most probably through to the super eight, and Bangladesh will also be fancying their chances. However, it is unlikely that the minnows can consistently sustain their form, and this means that their games in the super eight will be rendered useless. Another upset, and England’s poor form could actually render the whole super eight exercise to a sham!

Read the rest of this entry »

Sports. What a great reason to blog! We are three young men from India who have been great friends since 2001.

Sports has been one of the favourite topics of discussion over the past 4 years (besides Van Gogh, Energy Trading, Eco, Adam Smith and ofcourse existentialism. yeah, right!) and here you will find our opinions on just about everything related to Sports, from Federer to KPS Gill, from Bryant to Venugopal and from Koizumi? to Messi.
We have some definite ideas about where we want this blog to head. Some of us (read one) is in it for the money, though I dont know how he plans to raise it!
Chances are this blog is going to die a natural death in 15 days. Watch this space!

Funny, this blog starts at the fag end of the greatest show on earth.

Zarquon

Hope you enjoy this:

Z

1- pointers:

1. Who is the only Englishman to have won two Champions league titles? ( I don’t mean the European Cup- only Champions league)

Steve Mcmanaman (Real Madrid)
2. The two goal scorers for England in the 1966 final both came from the same club. Which one? (More clues? Prominently appears in a Jeffrey Archer book!)

West Ham United
3. Identify this player and complete this list. -

Watford (Trainee-89)- Liverpool (92-99)- Aston Villa- West Ham United- Manchester City- _______________

David James and Portsmouth
4. Who is the only Englishman on FIFA’s All Star team for the 2006 World Cup?

John Terry

5. Where will this year’s Champions league final be held?

Athens
_____________________________________________

2-pointers

1. Footballers are known to be greedy mercenaries (some of them anyway) And then at times chaps like this guy come along: Having suffered a serious injury, he offered his employers (who were severely cash strapped) to sign him at the top-flight pro’s minimum wage amound of $1500 a month during the 2005 season. He even trained with the youth team during his rehabilation period. He came back and made the first team towards the end of the 2005 season. Who?

Damiano Tomassi (Roma)
2. Born in Chingford, England, X had spells with both Milwall and Tottenham. X has also had trials at Bournemouth and Ipswich Town where he won an FA Youth Cup medal as a substitute in 2005. He is now currently playing with Crystal Palace in The Championship and he hopes to impress over the coming season. All of 18, a lot of things are expected from X, his father is a very successful footballer himself and still continues to score goals in the top flight. Identify this
kid.

Charlie Sheringham
3. Born in Morocco, he started his career at USM Casablanca. At the next World Cup, his national team were expected to fare so poorly that all of 200 fans had followed them to the host country. At the team’s final training session, one of his boot’s split open, the team didn’t have a sponsor and he didn’t have an extra pair. He eventually borrowed a pair from one of his teammates, and then went on a scoring spree. Who?

Jus Fontaine (13 goals in the 1958 World Cup)
4. Complete this list : Michel Preud’homme, __________ Oliver Kahn, Gianluigi Buffon ( and don’t Google!)

Fabien Barthez (1998)
5. What is so unique about Cardiff winning the 1927 English FA Cup? A feat which is unlikely to ever be repeated.
Cardiff is a city in Wales.
6. Identify the event: the biggest reason for the Sun selling only 12,000 copies on an average in an English city.

Hilsborough Tragedy
7. Only case of son replacing the father in an international match when the son came on as a substitute in a friendly replacing his dad. The Father was just 17 when the son was born!

Father: played for Anderlecht

Son: Started with PSV Eindhoven in 1994. Who?

Eidur Gudjohnsen and his father
_______________________________________________

3-pointers:

1. Little known fact: In 1974, FIFA actually awarded the 1986 World Cup to Colombia, but a number of infrastructure and logistical problems meant that by 1983, FIFA was looking for a new host for the 1986 World Cup. Brazil, United States, Mexico and Canada put in bids to host the World Cup.
Now, the leader of the U.S. bid X was trying his level best to revive the sport in the country, he was vocally supported by both Pele and Franz Beckenbauer in trying to bring the cup to the U.S. , but FIFA decided to award the rights to Mexico instead. It is said that Havelange wanted to teach U.S a lesson because the U.S football association had changed the offside line and also used shoot outs to decide drawn matches. Now, for 3 points tell me who led the U.S. bid - X?

Henry Kisinger
2. 1950 FA Cup Semi-Final - Arsenal Vs Chelsea

Chelsea are up 2-1 and with seconds to go, Arsenal win a corner. X takes the corner and his brother scores the equalizer. Arsenal wins the reply 1-0 and go on to beat Liverpool in the final 2-0. X’s football career was cut short by a knee injury.

X, however was known for his exploits in another sport and also as the brand ambassador for a particular product. After retirement X became a journalist and a commentator for BBC.

Dennis Compton ( and his brother Leslie Compton)