michael phelps vs. ryan lochte?
i was watching those two (plus czeh) compete in athens 04 and world championships 07...and it seems that ryan was much faster then. i was expecting somethin great from him (maybe even knock one gold medal off of michael) in beijing this yr...but he only got bronze in both 200 and 400 IM against phelps and czeh...did michael and czeh get faster or did ryan get slower (maybe his stomach virus?)? i feel like lochte didn't do the very best that he could... he used to be really close to MP, always chasing him down, pushing him to the limit. i didn't see that happening in beijing. the distance between them IMO got bigger this year than in both athens and world 07. czeh did much better...silver! what do you guys think?
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Actually, coming into the Olympics, Phelps and Lochte SHARED the world record in the 200 IM. Phelps did improve and Lochte had a bit of a slower meet in the IM races. He did, of course set a world record in winning the 200m back about 10 days ago.
Well I have a lot of respect for both of them, Phelps will always be my role model in my swimming just because he has a wonderful personality and is the most decorated Olympian, so he has my respect and admiration. However Lochte has been my favourite the last three years just because of how much he trained for this, he didn't have the same natural talent Phelps does and so he trained harder than any other swimmer. That is what really makes him stand out to me personally, because I don't have the natural talent to finish 1st in every meet I go to but I've been working a lot harder this year because of his inspiration and dropped 4 seconds off my 200 fly in the last meet.
I'm not trying to be mean or anything. But I think they're both good. Maybe Michael wanted the 8 golds more, so he pushed himself harder. You know, when you have a goal, it motivates you more. Not saying that Lochte doesn't want the gold. But Phelps might want the gold more than Lochte does.
well lochte did win 200 back. i thought he did pretty well considering he was sick.