FINA WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS

Day Six - March 18

Today was the last full day of workouts, and the competition starts tomorrow with Troy Dumais and Mitch Richeson in the men’s 3-meter synchro prelims at 10 a.m., followed by Haley Ishimatsu and Mary Beth Dunnichay in the women’s 10-meter synchro prelims. The men’s finals will be held at 5:30 p.m., and the women’s finals at 8:45 p.m.

Results will be available at http://www.omegatiming.com/swimming/racearchives/index.htm.

After a strong week of mostly two-a-day workouts (a few people have been given a workout or two off to rest, depending on their competition schedules), Team USA is ready.

Troy and Mitch will dive fourth in a field of 17, and Haley and Mary Beth will be the first competitors up in the women’s 10-meter synchro event. There seems to be no real consensus on where people prefer to be in the dive order – some say they prefer to be early in the list so they don’t have to wait around as long, and others said it doesn’t matter but that they’d prefer to follow another top diver in order to build off the momentum and scores. Defending champion Laura Wilkinson will be the final competitor in Tuesday’s women’s 10-meter prelims.

One thing's for certain -- things should be a little quieter at the pool for Monday’s competition now that the Formula One race is over. Hopefully they'll also be reopening some of the nearby roads to alleviate some of the traffic issues. We had a chance to watch a bit of the race from the pool on Sunday as it was going on as we were getting ready for our second workout of the day. As expected, it was fairly loud, but it was exciting to see.

We had a team dinner after our last workout on Sunday. Trivia time – If you saw a menu item of angel hair pasta with prawns and pippies, would you know what pippies are? Apparently, they’re like oysters, and the people who tried them said they were delicious.

- Jen Lowery