Ever since Chad Le Clos toppled Michael Phelps as the Olympic 200m butterfly king four years ago, he has wanted to achieve the mantle of greatness too.
Today he embarks on realising that dream when he bids to defend the title he won as a young upstart at London 2012.
Le Clos will compete in the heats this afternoon (6.39pm SA time) with the semifinals scheduled for late in the night (3.16am tomorrow SA time).
Only one man has successfully defended his Olympic crown in this event, and that was Phelps, the American legend and the most prolific medallist in Olympic history, who returned to the pool after a two-year retirement following the last Games.
In that time, Le Clos usurped Phelps’s 100m and 200m butterfly titles at the 2013 world championships, and the following year he was without peer in the ’fly at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.
But last year, veteran Hungarian Laszlo Cseh stunned Le Clos to take the 200m butterfly title.
The South African kept his 100m title, but in the US at the same time, Phelps competed in a small gala and clocked the year’s fastest times in both races.
This year, Cseh has thrown down the gauntlet with the year’s fastest times in both races, and his 1 minute 52.91 second in the 200m butterfly is the quickest since 2009.
And don’t ignore the two highly ranked Japanese swimmers, Daiya Seto and Masato Sakai, who are part of their country’s programme to produce champions at the Tokyo Games in 2020.
Le Clos faces a horde of challengers in what could be the most competitive men’s swimming event of the Games.
And Le Clos will have to go faster than he’s ever been before – his personal best remains his golden 1:52:96 from four years ago – to realise his goal of being a great butterfly swimmer.
He has spoken about world records in the past, and although he has achieved that over short-course 25m lengths, he’s never done it in an Olympic-sized 50m pool.
Today Le Clos will just want to look more threatening in the water in the opening round than countryman Cameron van der Burgh did in the heats of the 100m breaststroke on Saturday afternoon.
Le Clos faces epic rematch with Phelps
Today he embarks on realising that dream when he bids to defend the title he won as a young upstart at London 2012.
Le Clos will compete in the heats this afternoon (6.39pm SA time) with the semifinals scheduled for late in the night (3.16am tomorrow SA time).
Only one man has successfully defended his Olympic crown in this event, and that was Phelps, the American legend and the most prolific medallist in Olympic history, who returned to the pool after a two-year retirement following the last Games.
In that time, Le Clos usurped Phelps’s 100m and 200m butterfly titles at the 2013 world championships, and the following year he was without peer in the ’fly at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.
But last year, veteran Hungarian Laszlo Cseh stunned Le Clos to take the 200m butterfly title.
The South African kept his 100m title, but in the US at the same time, Phelps competed in a small gala and clocked the year’s fastest times in both races.
This year, Cseh has thrown down the gauntlet with the year’s fastest times in both races, and his 1 minute 52.91 second in the 200m butterfly is the quickest since 2009.
And don’t ignore the two highly ranked Japanese swimmers, Daiya Seto and Masato Sakai, who are part of their country’s programme to produce champions at the Tokyo Games in 2020.
Le Clos faces a horde of challengers in what could be the most competitive men’s swimming event of the Games.
And Le Clos will have to go faster than he’s ever been before – his personal best remains his golden 1:52:96 from four years ago – to realise his goal of being a great butterfly swimmer.
He has spoken about world records in the past, and although he has achieved that over short-course 25m lengths, he’s never done it in an Olympic-sized 50m pool.
Today Le Clos will just want to look more threatening in the water in the opening round than countryman Cameron van der Burgh did in the heats of the 100m breaststroke on Saturday afternoon.
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