The Leaving London Series: Australia & Germany Searching For Answers

The two swimming federations with the most frustration coming out of the London Olympic Games are easily the Australians and the Germans.  Two traditional powerhouse programs with borderline disastrous results in London.

Stephanie Rice was unable to reclaim
the magic she had in Beijing at the
London Olympic Games in 2012

Australian medalists...

GOLD... Women's 4x100FR Relay
SILVER... James Magnussen 100FR
SILVER... Christian Sprenger 100BR
SILVER... Emily Seebohm 100BK
SILVER... Alicia Coutts 200IM
SILVER...  Women's 4x200FR Relay
SILVER... Women's 4x100 Medley Relay
BRONZE... Bronte Barratt 200FR
BRONZE... Alicia Coutts 100FL
BRONZE... Men's 4x100 Medley Relay

German medalists...

SILVER... Thomas Lurz 10km Open Water

ABC Australia did a thorough job analyzing the problems with the Australian swimming program.  Clearly there are a lot of deep resentment within the infrastructure of the sport, where the roles and goals of the executives, the coaches, and the athletes are in contrast.  Just 10 medals, 1 gold... not good, especially from the traditionally strong men's squad.  There were a number of disappointing performances but of particular disappointment to Aussies had to be Brenton Rickard and the performance on the men's 4x100 team, that almost looked like it could of actually used Ian Thorpe.

Brenton Rickard, Aussie breaststroke start and world record holder in the 100BR entering the Olympic Games, saw his world record get smashed by Cameron van der Burgh while Rickard finished a disappointing 6th.

The Australian relay team that many thought were a shoe-in for Gold, the men's 4x100FR relay were out-touched on the last leg by the Russians and the Aussies finished an ultra-disappointing 4th.

The problems on the German side are a little tougher to pin point because there is little out there in terms of the media assessing the German problems.  Zero medals in the pool and just 1 medal from a 32-year old open water swimmer can not be the outcome that the German swimmers were aiming for in London.  Piling onto the German medal drought is that there is not really anyone the German team can point to and say they are building around him or her for future International success.

German freestyle star Paul Biedermann, current world record holder in the 200FR (1:42.00) could only muster a 5th place finish in the 200FR and a time of 1:45.53, which is obviously well off his record best.

On the women's side for Germany, defending Olympic champion and world record holder Britta Steffen finished a disappointing 4th in the 50FR and missed the 100FR Final by quite a bit.

The Germans and the Australians have a lot of rebuilding to do over the next quadrennial.

LATER TODAY... Sun Yang (teaser: he's really fast)