The Leaving London Series: Ryan Lochte

With the nature of swimming's popularity cycle coming to a peak every four years at the Olympics, these London Games were a fascinating study in how the general public views swimming as compared to those who follow the sport on a regular basis.

Ryan Lochte was the darling of the swimming community since the Beijing Games.  Seemingly upset with his performance in Beijing, Lochte was a man on a mission over the last 4 years.  The first man to break a world record after the rule revisions with the swim suits.  Lochte owned Twitter, posted videos of his strength training exploits, and seemingly became the most popular swimmer on the planet.  Accessible, personable, the swimmer's swimmer.

However, something changed after Lochte claimed gold in the 400IM in London.

Lochte let down the US general public in the 200FR finishing 4th and was out-touched by the French in the 4x100FR relay... all of a sudden Lochte became more Alain Bernard like...  Jason Lezak would have never "let" the French win.  The casual fans were not in Lochte's corner.  All Lochte's talk about how much he trained to win in London was undone by Yannick Agnel and his brilliant 46.74 split.

After some redemption in the 4x200FR relay that Lochte led off, it was really the brilliant split by Conor Dwyer that set up for Michael Phelps to anchor and pull away for the dominating victory.

200BK... Lochte leads the world for 150m but then Tyler Clary and Ryosuke Irie blew by Lochte who would eventually settle for Bronze.

200IM... Lochte left in the dust of Michael Phelps.

All of a sudden the Lochte narrative is that he is Phil Mickelson so Phelps' Tiger Woods.  But wait, does that narrative stand up?

Here are the general news items on how Lochte is perceived following his Olympic events...

Ryan Lochte is sort of a douche (WWTDD)

Lochte eyes 'DWTS and 'The Bachelor' (UPI & every gossip site on the web)

Bill Simmons of ESPN jokingly listed Ryan Lochte as a -350 betting favourite to be the US team member most likely to have an Olympic village sex-tape "leaked".  In Lochte's defense, Simmons then listed Lochte as the favourite over Usain Bolt who despite US protests is not a member of the US Olympic team...  And this was an easy crack after the flap with Lochte's mother stating that Lochte went on a lot of one-night stands (to paraphrase).

Ryan Lochte WTF?  What happened to the young man who could do no wrong and represented the best of what swimming is, this is pretty low brow stuff.  However, I guess he's launched himself into the popular culture discussion, beyond the swimming bubble.  It's just amazing that the man loved by the swimming community is so dragged through the mud in comparison to the American love affair with the Olympic icon Phelps.

From all reports it appears that Lochte is going to continue on for another quadrennial to Rio 2016.  By the time Rio rolls around Lochte will be 31 (maybe 32) and carrying with him a medal record of 11 Olympic medals.  Lochte will have a lot to live up to and it will be interesting to see if his body can handle the load that his Gregg Troy program will throw Lochte leading up to Rio.  It won't be easy especially given that Lochte will have many of the distractions that sidetracked Phelps over the last 4 years.  Lochte is going to need to right the ship at some point and get back to being the Ryan Lochte that everyone in the swimming community admires.

Ultimately... Lochte is great for the sport, even if he is not beloved by popular culture.  If he has another 4 years left in him then it's good for the profile of swimming in the sports community.

TOMORROW... Suit Controversy?