Olympics
Swimming notebook: Kirk makes a quick splash

By Ron C. Judd
Seattle Times staff reporter

DEAN RUTZ / THE SEATTLE TIMES Dana Kirk checks the clock to see she has won her semifinal heat of the women's 100-meter butterfly. Kirk advances to tonight's final .07 behind the leader.

E-mail this article Print this article Search archive Most read articles Most e-mailed articles

LONG BEACH, Calif. — Dana Kirk wasn't supposed to be good, this early at the U.S. Olympic Trials.

But she'll take it, thanks.

Kirk, 19, the Bremerton native and the younger half of the Stanford-swimming-sisters duo with Tara, is considered a favorite to qualify for the Athens Olympics in the 200-meter butterfly, her specialty, on Sunday.

But she couldn't wait to make a lurch toward Athens with an impressive preliminary finish in the 100 version of the same race. Kirk vaulted from a ninth-place seeding to a fourth-place prelims finish heading into tonight's final.

There, she'll line up against a top-five field separated by only seven-hundredths of a second, with another formidable foe — legendary three-time Olympian Jenny Thompson — lurking another tenth of a second back. Kirk finished in 59.08 seconds — more than three-quarters of a second faster than her previous personal best.

All five swimmers — Kirk, Thompson (59.17) and prelims leaders Demerae Christianson (59.01), Rachel Komisarz (59.03) and Dana Vollmer (59.03) — will be fighting for the top two spots, each of which comes with a ticket to Athens.

"Somebody's going to go 57-something (seconds) to win this," Kirk predicted last night.

Her?

"Yes, maybe," she said. "I've got to keep it together."

Olympic trials excitement — coupled with realizing she led her semifinals heat with several strokes to go — caused her to look around at competitors, she said, possibly adding to her time.
 
"I did look around at the end," she said. "That probably cost me."

The glance almost turned out to be the least of her concerns.

Moments before her semifinal heat, Kirk panicked when she realized she had misplaced her credential — necessary to get onto the swim deck. At the last second, an old acquaintance — Rick Benner, Megan Quann's former coach from Puyallup, vouched for Kirk and got her through security.

Kirk's impressive first outing didn't surprise her coach, Stanford's Richard Quick, who has a notable track record in bringing swimmers to a competitive peak at the right time — for the trials and the Olympics.

"I'm absolutely convinced she can go faster," he said. "And she'll have to to win tomorrow."

Preliminary heats in Dana Kirk's 200 fly race begin Saturday. Initial heats for her sister, Tara, a breaststroker, begin today.

Tara Kirk is matched against Quann and Olympic vets Kristy Kowal, Amanda Beard and Staciana Stitts in the 100 breaststroke. Tomorrow night's final in that race is expected to be one of the most hotly contested at the trials.

The first night's finals, which included an impressive world-record swim by Baltimore teenager Michael Phelps, have set the stage for a memorable Olympic trials, Dana Kirk said.

"It brings home what this is about," she said. "Everyone can feed off that excitement."

Coughlin stays focused

Much ado has been made about teen superstar Michael Phelps' decision to swim six events at the trials. But former Cal star Natalie Coughlin, his potential female counterpart in the multi-event, superstar category, is taking a different approach.

Coughlin, America's most versatile female swimmer, also had top seed times for a fistful of events coming into these Olympic trials. Unlike Phelps, she's opting to focus on her three fastest races: the 50-meter freestyle, 100 freestyle, and the 100 backstroke, in which she is the world record-holder at 59.58 seconds.

Some swimming insiders have praised her decision, saying it makes sense to focus on your best chances for a gold medal. Others say she should have thrown caution to the wind and went for all of it: How often does a swimmer get the chance to grab the national sports spotlight?

Either way, her decision has huge ramifications for other events, where dropping her name off the top of the seedings list suddenly threw the field wide open to other competitors, including some Northwest hopefuls. Coughlin was the No. 1 seed in the 100 butterfly, perhaps opening the door to an Olympic bid for Dana Kirk. And she was ranked first — by a wide margin — in the 200 backstroke, an event in which Puyallup native Jamie Reid is ranked third.

Coughlin swims her first event, the 100 backstroke, tomorrow.

Tape-delay on West Coast

The swimming trials will be telecast live two nights on NBC to most of the nation — but not the West Coast, where the event would have cut into 5 p.m. local news slots. The network will offer tape-delayed coverage at 8 p.m. Friday and 8 p.m. Sunday, U.S. Swimming officials said. NBC also is expected to offer updates on swimming during its Saturday U.S. Olympic track trials coverage.