Prediction Contest Winner ~ Jessie!

It was pretty tight this time. It was all the fault of that Brent Hayden. He wasn't on the heat sheet, and he is fast! He knocked a few races off our plans by putting himself on the podium.
Also the loss of Simon Burnett and Ryan Lochte sent things spinning a bit too. But Jessie squeaked out a nice win here. Poor Timmay is the fair loser.

Jessie - 420
Terrie - 415
AimsRos - 394
lala - 390
blairbecky - 388
TimTheSwimmer - 386
Florence DQ!! - Single handed touch on her final turn. (She left out 7 events )

We will see when Michelle gets home if there are any actual prizes for Winner Jessie and Loser Timmay. But until then the two of you should wallow in deep feelings of victory and loss.

We are now in the last few weeks leading up to Nationals, and Brendan feels pretty great about how that will be going. After seeing his races this last weekend, I am even more excited to see what he does this summer.

Phelps refines his formula for winning

Kidding aside, he did lose to Brendan Hansen in the 100 breaststroke in Long Beach in January. (Hansen, who was in Santa Clara, won his second race of the meet, the 200 breaststroke, in 2:13.49.) So having lost to Hansen is hardly a black mark, considering Hansen is the world-record holder.

"Honestly, I think Michael hates to lose. I think about 90% of swimmers love to win and 10% hate to lose," Bowman said. "Brendan Hansen and Michael are in the 10%."

Record form for Phelps

"We use these meets to figure out where we are in the season," Hansen said. "I think come the next couple of weeks, we're going to work on speed work, which isn't too hard to do. It's harder to get into shape. I definitely feel like I'm in shape, I just didn't have the speed tonight or on Friday."

Congratulations to Jessie! Nice Work!

EDITED TO ADD: Hey guess what?! I have been remiss to mention a few very important birthdays.....
Happy belated Birthday to the following bloggers:

BeachGirl - July 1st
Ms of Arc - July 3rd
Crackinup - July 3rd
Schembsie - July 4th

I hope you all had fantastic birthdays! July babies get to celebrate all summer!! Woot!