Le Clos aiming at nine medals in Glasgow Games
CHAD le Clos is likely to target nine trips to the podium at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in three months’ time. And judging by the form he showed at the SA Swimming Championships in Durban last week, that’s not such an unlikely prospect.
The Olympic champion will take on the 50, 100 and 200m butterfly, the 200 and 400m individual medley and the 200m backstroke as his individual events and is likely to be included in three relay teams – the 4x100m and 4x200m freestyle and the 4x100m medley relay.
Rather strange then, that national coach Graham Hill has only predicted an overall haul of nine medals for the SA swimming team in Glasgow.
By the time the pooldeck was cleared for the final time in Durban on Saturday night, Hill admitted to being disappointed that the number of Commonwealth Games qualifiers was relatively low. A total of nine swimmers qualified in 17 events.
“It’s a bit of an anticlimax,” admitted Hill. “I think we expected a lot more from our younger generation. Maybe we were trying too hard with the youngsters. We thought a couple of them would really get on and they just didn’t really.
“But all is not lost. We’ve still got two years to go to the Olympics. And for those youngsters who are just missing the times now, the secret is to keep them in the loop and keep them there for Rio,” added the coach.
The nine swimmers who achieved qualifying times were immediately added to the team list that will be put forward to Sascoc for confirmation.
And 10 more names were added to make up five relay teams – three for the men and two for the women.
Missing out because of Swimming SA’s policy of not picking swimmers in the shorter, non-Olympic events, is Giulio Zorzi – the man who claimed a bronze medal at last year’s World Championships in the 50m breaststroke behind Cameron van der Burgh.
“If he had come out and swum a remarkably fast time – one of the top times in the world, then maybe we could have considered him, but our policy is we won’t pick on the 50s – outside of Olympic events. And the time he swam here wasn’t even top six in the Commonwealth,” explained Hill, who admitted his chief concern among the men’s team is the lack of depth in the backstroke events.
As a result, despite being a double world champion in the butterfly events, Le Clos may be used to swim the backstroke in the 4x100m medley relay, leaving Dylan Bosch, Sebastien Rousseau or Brett Walsh to take on the butterfly leg.
Hill’s estimate of nine medals in Glasgow is a relatively conservative one, not only considering Le Clos’s programme of events.
Fellow Olympic champion Van der Burgh is likely to bag two medals of his own (in the 50 and 100m breaststroke) and then there is the evergreen Roland Schoeman, who, at 33 is still very much in with a shout in the 50m freestyle and butterfly.
There’s also Karin Prinsloo, who, with five titles (two in SA record time) in the last week, seems to have regained her confidence and is only getting better, and of course the relay teams.
Taking into account that 15 medals were won in swimming at the Commonwealth Games four years ago (apart from the disabled events where the nowretired Natalie du Toit cleaned up), surely Team SA should do better than nine.