After posting Olympic qualifying standards in three events in the first two Grand Prix of the season, Chad le Clos will be looking to continue his early form when he lines up at the Port Elizabeth edition today and tomorrow.
Le Clos posted a fast 51.82 seconds in the 100m butterfly event in Nelspruit last month before he dipped below the qualifying standards in the 200m butterfly and freestyle in Durban a fortnight ago.
Although South African swimmers will only be able to qualify at the SA Nationals and Olympic trials in April, Le Clos’ times would give him a strong foundation ahead of the Rio Olympic Games in August.
This means the Olympic gold medallist is on course in the three main events he would be targeting in little over five months.
Main rivals Hungarian Laszlo Cseh and American legend Michael Phelps have also posted fast times early on in the season.
Cseh boasts the leading time of 51.40sec, while Phelps’51.94sec is the third fastest so far in 2016 behind Le Clos.
In Durban, Le Clos posted the third fastest 200m butterfly time this year, clocking 1:56.42 while his 200m freestyle time of 1:47.54 is ranked the sixth fastest in the world.
Le Clos is scheduled to participate in the 50m butterfly and the 100m freestyle in PE where he will be racing against the rest of the country’s freestyle swimmers.
Winning the 100m freestyle in Nelspruit with a time of 49.22sec, Le Clos is the only South African swimmer that has dipped below 50 seconds this year.
The rest of the freestyle swimmers will be looking to get as close as possible to the qualifying standard of 48.99sec before the national championships for their individual tickets to Rio and for the 4x100m relay team.
The 16-year-old Mariella Venter was one of the surprise packages in Durban where she won both the 200m and 100m backstroke.
Her times in both events are two seconds short of the Olympic qualifying mark and she will be looking to make some inroads into those times before the trials in a month’s time.
Her coach, Peter Williams, believed his protege realised her potential following her swim in Durban.
“Mariella is somewhat of a revelation, I’ve been around swimming for the best part of 40 years both as an athlete and coach, and seldom does a swimmer of this natural talent come along,” Williams said.
“If we can repeat the times that we did in Durban, I would be a happy coach which would give us six weeks to manipulate the training and see how close we can get to the 200m qualifying time.
She is 2.3 seconds off at the moment.”
Meanwhile, 2012 Olympian in London Karin Prinsloo is looking to put a niggling shoulder injury in the past as she focusses her attention on the 100m and 200m freestyle.
She has been off the pace due to injury and bouts of illness with her 200m freestyle nearly three seconds away from the qualifying mark, while her 100m time was almost two-and-a-half seconds short of the required Olympic standard. – The Star