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We take a Thorpedo hit, and we shrug
By GARY SHELTON
© St. Petersburg Times, published September 17, 2000
SYDNEY, Australia -- Perhaps it is a good thing we are not like this.
We do not cram into a swimming stadium the size of an NBA arena. We do not paint our faces and wave our flags for the glory of athletes splashing about. We do not sing and clap and chant and cheer. We do not discuss split times the way we discuss, say, fantasy football.
We do not go crazy for this sport called swimming. Our children do not have posters of record holders on their walls. We do not let our hearts rise and fall like waves across a pool in the name of the sport.
Perhaps it is good that we are not like Australia. Because if this sport mattered even a little, then today would hurt quite a lot.
The battle has been lost.
The war appears difficult to win.
And forget about the arms race; for goodness' sake, get our swimmers some feet.
The men's swimming team of the United States was thrashed Saturday. Also thumped. Also Thorped. The Australians captured the first two skirmishes of what increasingly looks like a new international rivalry.
It happened in the blink of an eye. One minute, Gary Hall Jr. had come from behind to take the lead, America was still the dominant swimming power on the globe, and the world had order. Then Ian Thorpe flashed by like a great beast, like something Peter Benchley would write about, and everything you thought you knew about the sport was swirling down the drain. Counterclockwise, even.
This was America's sport, for goodness' sake, and America's event. This was the 400 freestyle relay, which the United States had lost, well, never. Not in the Olympics or world championships, at least. The event had become as American as the bacon cheeseburger. Seven times it had been held in the Olympics; seven times the United States had won the gold.
No more. Thorpe, the teenager too good to be true, the kid they call the Thorpedo, changed all that. He came running onto the pool deck seconds before the event began, still adjusting his suit. Then he jumped into the water, and he left America's dignity among the wreckage.
This was the kid winning the gunfight. Historically, the Americans have had most of the performances in swimming, but Australia has had most of the passion. Aussies are crazy about the sport that appears in the back of most American sports sections. Despite the size of the nation (roughly, the land area of America), most Australians live on the outer circle. Some 90 percent of Aussies live within 100 miles of the water, so maneuvering through it quickly is quite the deal.
So the Aussies had come into the Olympics determined to make their presence felt, which meant, of course, outperforming the Americans. Which is when the noise began. Hall said the Americans were going to "smash the Australians like guitars." Australia's Kieren Perkins responded by calling Hall a "drug cheat," a reference to his marijuana suspension.
It sounded like a rivalry. For the most part, however, the two nations were like rival street gangs claiming separate turf. Thorpe wasn't going to swim against Lenny Krayzelburg, for instance. Perkins wasn't going to swim against Tom Dolan. It was as if the nations had divvied up the gold before the meet.
But the relay was Tombstone. This was where the best swimmers of each team intersected in a competition important to all.
The Australians had beaten the United States in the Pan Pacific Games a year ago, a loss dismissed by the Americans as something of a fluke because Hall had been unable to swim. When the Americans trounced Australia in the Olympic prelims, some of the swagger seemed to return.
But winning streaks are all about the past, and this was all about the future. It was about Thorpe, 17, taking over the race, the sport, the country as the first steps in creating his legacy.
Oh, he has been breaking records for some time now. Every time he gets wet, it seems. Thorpe is such a record machine he should be sponsored by Wurlitzer. One of these days, the guy is going to set a mark while taking a bath.
This was better than a record, however. This was about chasing down a sprinter the quality of Hall, in a race that always has belonged to your rival, in front of your family, friends and countrymen.
Perhaps it is a good thing that swimming is an afterthought of a sport in our country. Otherwise, we might think there was some explaining to do. This is how dominating Thorpe was. The Americans weren't even disappointed. "Some days, you finish second," Neil Walker said.
You know something special when you see it. Thorpe is special -- decade-of-dominance special. Before he is finished, historians will refer to Jim as "the other Thorpe."
Soon, he will be a legend. And a race such as this one is a good place to start.
It had been such a hectic night for Thorpe. He had won the gold medal in the 400 free, beating the nearest American, bronze medalist Klete Keller, by almost 61/2 seconds. By the time Keller finished, Thorpe's hair was dry.
Then came the swimdown, then the medal ceremony. Suddenly, Thorpe had to be on the deck for the relay. Four people had to help him tug on his sharkskin suit, and he rushed onto the deck. And then he punched America's lights out.
The Aussies took the race to America early, Michael Klim swimming the first 100 in world record time. When Thorpe entered the pool as the anchor leg, the Aussies led by a quarter of a second.
Hall, however, is a sprinter by trade. He caught Thorpe and passed him. Thorpe kept stroking, then flashed past Hall to win. Seconds later, the Australian team members were playing air guitars, an obvious response to Hall.
"The last 20 meters are a blur," Thorpe said. "I just swam as fast as I can, as hard as I can. This has to be the best day of my life. The best hour. The best minutes."
He talks like that. He is young and humble and talented, so together he will make you want to yell at the teenager in your house. He frowns at praise. He shrugs at money. "Money is fickle," he said. "You can't buy what I felt today."
Perhaps it is good we are not like Australia. Otherwise, we would have to listen to the fans chant a hero's name into the night and think of how many years we will have to hear it. We would have to feel the sting of losing something for the first time to a new rival.
Instead, we can enjoy the rare view from the second-place podium.
You know. The land down under.
Olympics 2000
WHERE: Sydney, Australia.
TV: 11 a.m.-6 p.m., 7 p.m.-midnight, 12:30 a.m.-2, Ch. 8; 9 a.m.-4 p.m., MSNBC; 4-9 p.m., CNBC.
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