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From Volume 1 Number 5 (June 2000)
8 May: Two of the former East German's top
sports officials finally came to trial in Berlin today. Manfred Ewald,
73, was the man who directed the East German Sport and Gymnastics Union
and was nicknamed the Honecker of Sport. Ewald drafted the 1974 secret
State Plan 14.25, which laid down a state policy of administering
anabolic steroids to young athletes. Athletes were tricked or forced
into taking these drugs with no knowledge of the consequences. Manfred
Hoeppner, now 66, was the doctor second-in-charge of the DDR Sports
Medicine Service, and oversaw the national distribution of
performance-enhancing drugs, determining each athlete's dose and
recording the effects.
The contemporary effects of this drug policy were the deepened voices noted by other swimmers, growth of body hair, and increased acne, but the real side-effects were to become apparent later, as athletes of all sports were diagnosed with liver damage, hormonal disturances, and gynaecological complaints. It will be interesting to see how the two defendants respond publicly to the charges made, and also how the new German political and legal systems delve into this unsavoury aspect of recent history.
13 May: The first day of the long awaited Australian Championships and Olympic Trials at the Sysney Aquatic Centre, venue for the Olympic Games later this year. Highlight of Day 1 was, inevitable, Ian Thorpe, who swam a further world record in the 400 freestyle, 3-41.33, taking half a second off the record he set in August last year. The two sets of splits were:
| August 1999 | May 2000 |
| 53.15 1-51.03 2-46.29 3-41.83 |
54.07 1-49.14 2-45.18 3-41.33 |
Amazingly, Thorpe was almost 10 seconds ahead of Grant Hackett's second place 3-51.05, while Dan Kowalski and Kieren Perkins dropped out of the final to concentrate on the 200 and 1500 metres respectively.
Other outstanding performers in the semi-final rounds included Dyana Calub who set a Commonwealth record of 28.89 in the 50 backstroke, Geoff Huegill whose 23.77 for the 50 butterfly was also a Commonwealth record. Petria Thomas surprised Susan O'Neill in the 100 butterfly to win one semi-final in 58.05 (making her third best performer of all time).
14 May: Another Thorpe record came on the second day in the heats of the 200 metres. No fewer than six men went under 1-50, with Thorpe leading the way with 1-45.69. Again, comparative splits with his last record:
| Previous record | May 2000 |
| 24.92 52.01 1-18.95 1-46.00 |
24.97 52.04 1-19.12 1-45.69 |
A second world record came in the 50 butterfly, where Geoff Huegill's 23.60 took 0.8 off Denis Pankratov's record, which has stood since 1996.
In the women's 50 back Diane Calub again set a Commonwealth mark with a 28.86, but Petria Thomas dropped back slightly but still won the 100 butterfly, in 58.43.
15 May: ...inevitably the name of Ian Thorpe comes up again, today with a further world record in the 200 free. His final winning time was 1-45.51, just over a second ahead of Michael Klim's 1-46.89. For the split-minded, Thorpe's intermediate times were 24.63, 51.03, 1-18.18, 1-45.51. Susie O'Neill set a Commonwealth record in qualifying for the ladies 200 metres final, her 1-57.47 making her the fifth fastest swimmer ever at this distance.
The following day, 16 May, sees Susie O'Neill take the 200 free top spot in 1-57.70, and also qualify for the 200 fly final in a Commonwealth record 2-06.51 from Petria Thomas's 2-09.94. Thorpe is not to be forgotten: he qualifies for the 100 free final with a 49.45, ranking third behind Chris Fydler (49.01) and Michael Klim (49.31). Six men swim below 50 seconds.
Thorpe swims consistently well, again, in the 100 final on 17 May, but his 49.74 can place him only fourth behind Klim's Australian record 48.56. In any case this final is overshadowed by Susie O'Neill's 200 fly in which she finally beats the 19-year old world record set by Mary T. Meagher. One wonders how low she can take it later this year.
For those interested in these things, here are the comparative splits of the 1981 Meagher record and the 2000 O'Neill record:
| Meagher | O'Neill |
| Brown Deer, Wisconsin | Sydney |
| 16 Augusr 1981 | 17 May 2000 |
| 29.53 1-01.41 1-33.69 2-05.96 |
28.51 1-00.24 1-32.71 2-05.81 |
At the same time spare a thought for Petria Thomas, second behind O'Neill in the 200 fly in Atlanta. Still recovering from shoulder surgery last year, her 2-07.21 was the eleventh fastest 200 fly ever, and she must be encouraged to think about going one better in the Olympics.
News from China, whose Olympic trials are being held at the same time, concerns swimmers performing below par. 400 IM world champion Chen Yan slumped to 5th spot in her favourite event, while Liu Limin, 1996 silver medalist in 100 fly, was said to be disappointed with her 59.86 effort.
This extract was from Volume 1 Number 5 (June 2000). To view another extract from Waterworld, just click here.
From Volume 1 Number 8 (September 2000)
Our long-distance swimming readers, and all of us who applaud triumphs over adversity would have been cheered to hear of the success of James Pittar, a blind Australian tax officer, who completed the 15-mile swim from Martha's Vinevard to Nantucket in around 8 hours. He was reportedly kept on course by his escorting kayakers giving signals with whistles.
Another long-distance success nearer to home, the North Channel crossing of Steve Price from Clevedon in Somerset. Steve swam the notoriously cold and rough strait in 16 hours and 52 minutes, without the artificial aid of a wetsuit, and as far as we know without national publicity (see Watermarks issue 6, page 5).
Not such good news is reported regarding the European Masters Championships in 2001, to be held in Palma de Mallorca. Our long-distance spies inform us that the 5 km open water event is, for the first time, to have an age ceiling of 69 years i.e. the top of the 65-69 group. A letter of protest has already been penned by John Slater, former BLDSA secretaty and now Spanish resident. There are plenty of 70-plus swimmers who are more than capable of covering 5km in open water, certainly plenty in Europe as a whole; there should be no problems with water temperature; there is no significant history of swimmers of this age suffering mishaps so what has got into the organiser's minds? One hopes that this limitation will be reversed. othewise it will not be long before restrictions are placed on other events. (Later investigation in the form of a conversation with LEN masters committee member Hans-Peter Sick reveals that this restriction is being made at the behest of the LEN Medical Committee.)
Further negative news concerns Julie Bradshaw. who was pictured in our July issue. Julie, you will recall, was bidding to swim the English Channel using butterfly and in preparation had swum a Coniston 2-way (10 miles). A crack at a 2-way Windermere (20 miles plus) had ended with an enforced exit thanks to the weather, and now, on 8 August, her attempt at the Channel itself also proved abortive as an injuty incurred during the Windermere swim asserted itself. After 12 hours and 19 minutes of swimming and only 2 miles off Calais this must have been a great disappointment.
Recent successful Channel swims include Kevin Murphy's thirty-first crossing, so equalling Mike Read as the "King of the Channel", while "Queen of the Channel" Alison Streeter has made her thirty-ninth crossing.
Not all the world's best masters swimmers were in Munich. At the South Pacific Long Course meet held at University of California Irvine during the weekend 12-13 August, 85-year-old Jim Eubank destroved five world records. His five performances, with most recent listed time in brackets:
100m 1.26.51(1.33.49)
200m 3.22.42(3.48.91)
400m 7.24.22(8.14.50)
800m 15.39.82(17.11.21)
1500m 29.53.88(33.08.42)
Another swimmer in form at Irvine. who would have made a big impression in Munich, was Karlyn Pipes-Neilsen. now aged 38. who clipped the best part of 10 seconds off the world's 1500 metres best with a 17.46.58 swim.
26 August: today thc final group of British swimmers is due to fly to the pre-Olympic holding camp on Australia's Gold Coast. The team's attitude to other sportsmen and women is interesting. In a poll of the 41-strong squad. asked to name the athlete they most respected, a staggering 22 turned to rowing and decided that Steve Redgravc deserved their greatest respect as he bids for his fifth consecutive gold medal. Other athletes mentioned were, inevitably, Alex Popov md Ian Thorpe. Redgrave's coxless four final is early in the morning on 23 September and as luck would have it there are only afternoon swimming finals that day, and so many of the team will be able to make the journey to the Penrith rowing course to support Redgrave's historic bid.
Trivia
Watermarks is sometimes guilty of airy flights of fancy but sometimes truth exceeds imagination. In the early days of the Olympic Games some events were held which have a strange appearance today.
In 1896, for example, at the first Olympic swimming competitions held in the Bay of Zea, near Piraeus there was a special race confined to sailors who were members of the Greek navy. All other Olympic swimming events have been open to all!
In 1900, when the Games were held in Paris and the swimming events in the Seine, as well as what was then a more or less conventional programme, there were two events that today seem completely out of place, even if the limited range of swimming in those days meant that some peculiar events did creep into the programmes of even the most serious events. The first of these events was a 200-metre obstacle race, the obstacles being a pole (over which the swimmers had to climb) and line of boats (which they had to clamber over), and another line of boats (which thcy had to swim under). The second was an underwater competition, in which points were awarded for the distance swum underwater (two points per metre), and for the time spent underwater (one point per second). The Paris Games also saw a 4000 metres race, but this no longer seems such an oddity.
The 1904 Games were held in St Louis as an adjunct of the World Fair.The programme of events included an 880-yards freestyle, which is not very odd, and a plunging competition, which now seems off but which was a standard event for much of the last century even if this was the only example of a plunging event in an international Games.
The 1904 Games also included a 440 yards breaststroke event, and it was repeated in the 1912 and 1920 Games. Hardly the most exciting of event, it was then dropped from the programme. W