D2 DIGEST COLLEGEFOOTBALL
Hokies extend Beamer’s deal through 2016 VirginiaTech has extended the
contract of football Coach Frank Beamer through the 2016 season. Beamer’s current deal was set
to expire at the end of 2012. The extension was announced by the school Saturday. The 63-year-old Beamer is en-
tering his 24th season with the Hokies. He is second among ac- tive coaches behind Penn State’s Joe Paterno with 229 career vic- tories. Under Beamer, the Hokies
have had six straight 10-win sea- sons and appeared in a bowl game for 17 consecutive seasons. . . .
Nebraska tight end Dreu
Young will undergo back surgery and could be out for the season. Young missed the season
opener a year ago after having back surgery but returned to play the other 13 games, starting nine of them. Coach Bo Pelini said that
Young won’t be back until at least midseason, if at all.
AUTORACING Brian Vickers had heart sur-
gery last month as part of his treatment for blood clots, but the NASCAR driver said he fully ex- pects to resume his racing career next season. Vickers, who has been out
since May because of clots in his leg and lungs, said he had two procedures in July to close a hole in his heart and insert a stent into a vein in his left leg. Although doctors diagnosed
the blood-clot disorder May- Thurner syndrome, Vickers be- lieves he’ll be off blood thinners by Jan. 1 and driving for Red Bull Racing when next season begins. “They gave me full clearance
for next year,” the 26-year-old driver said. “I will be back next season racing in January. I’m really excited about that.” He had surgery July 12 to close
the passageway, and a second procedure to insert the stent was done the next day.
GOLF Arjun Atwal shot a five-under
par 65 in the third round of the Wyndham Championship in Greensboro, N.C., building a three-stroke lead in the PGA Tour’s final pre-playoff event. At- wal, who has led or shared the lead after each of the first three days at Sedgefield Country Club, moved to 17-under 193 entering the final round. Scott McCarron closed his 63
with four consecutive birdies and was at 196 with Scott Piercy (64) and Lucas Glover (67). Will MacKenzie (65), Garrett
Willis (65), David Toms (65), Jus- tin Leonard (66), John Rollins (68) and second-round co-leader Brandt Snedeker (69) were at 197.
Atwal, winless on tour, is one
good round away from becoming the first Monday qualifier to win the ensuing tournament since Fred Wadsworth at the 1986 Southern Open. . . . In Sun River, Ore., Tom Leh-
man moved into position for his second Champions Tour major victory of the year, shooting a 3-under 69 at Crosswater Club to take a two-stroke lead in the Jeld-Wen Tradition. Bernhard Langer, attempting
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EZ SU
KLMNO SWIMMING
to join Gary Player as the only players in Champions Tour histo- ry to win three consecutive ma- jors, shot a 69 to join Fred Funk (70)andJ.L. Lewis (66) at9under.
BASKETBALL In Madrid, Kevin Durant
scored 15 points and the United States overcame a poor shooting start and early nerves to beat Lithuania, 77-61, in a warmup for the world championship. TheUnited States trailed, 15-7,
after shooting 3 of 21 and making six turnovers in the first period. The Americans took the lead
for good at 54-49 after Lithuania was assessed a technical foul and flagrant foul by Mantas Kalnietis near the end of the third period. It was part of a 17-0 run led by
RussellWestbrook and Eric Gor- don. Linas Kleiza scored 12 points
for Lithuania.
LITTLELEAGUE Jacob Jones had two homers
and five RBI, and Brooks Robin- son keyed an eight-run first in- ning with a two-run double to lift Hamilton, Ohio to a 16-6 victory over Toms River,N.J., at the Little League World Series in William- sport.
Robinson delivered his clutch opposite-field hit to left before Jones, batting ninth, lined an 0-1 fastball from Jeff Ciervo beyond the center field hedges for a two-run homer and an 8-0 lead. New Jersey scored six runs in
the first two innings, highlighted by Kevin Blum’s two-run triple to make it 9-6 in the second. . . . Lucas Soper pitched a com-
plete game and William Quito knocked in two runs as Vancou- ver, CanadadownedChitre,Pana- ma, 4-2. Panamahad a chance to win in
the bottom of the sixth with the bases loaded. But Soper, down to his last batter because of pitch count rules, got William Savedra to ground out to end the game. . . . Knox Carter hit a two-run
homer and two Columbus, Ga., pitchers combined on a two-hit- ter in a 6-2 win over Waipahu, Hawaii. Jacob Pate struck out seven
and walked four for Georgia, settling down after a rough first inning in which he allowed Ty DeSa’s two-run homer.
MISC. American sprinter Justin Gat-
lin won his third 100-meter race since returning from a four-year doping ban, clocking 10.28 sec- onds into a strong headwind at the Joensuu Games inHelsinki. The 2004 Olympic champion
beat countryman Rubin Williams by 0.12 of a second. In the qualifying heat he ran a
10.19, aided by a tailwind. The American made his come-
back at a smallmeet in Estoniaon Aug. 3, winning in 10.24. Five days later, he ran 10.17 to win in Tallinn, Estonia. Gatlin tested positive for ex-
cessive testosterone in April 2006. . . . Juan Manuel Lopez’s highly
anticipated featherweight title fight against Rafael Marquez, scheduled for Sept. 18 in Las Vegas, has been postponed after Marquez sustained a hand injury. —From news services
‘A long way to go’
Michael Phelps’s sporadic training affected his performances at the Pan Pacific Championships BY AMY SHIPLEY
irvine, calif. — This is the first year swimming star Mi- chael Phelps blatantly ignored his coach’s training plan. Some days he would show up to prac- tice, his coach, Bob Bowman, said this week. Other days he would sneak off and play golf. There would be no phone call, no heads up. Bowman would wait by the side of the pool at the designated workout time. If Phelps’s lane remained empty, he would go on without him. The unexplained absences
and lack of communication oc- casionally stretched for more than a week at a time. “Sometimes, Iwould getwor-
ried: ‘Is he okay?’ ” Bowman said. “Not that he wasn’t doing his freestyle work, just: ‘Is he okay?’ ” Phelps’s performance this
week at the Pan Pacific Champi- onships has reflected his spo- radic attention to the sport. Though he entered the final day of competition Saturday night with a chance to take home five gold medals, he failed to ad- vance to the final of an event in which he holds a world record and dropped out of another Saturday morning because he was out of gas.He acknowledged repeatedly that he arrived here in poor shape and felt disap- pointed with some of his times. “There’s a long way to go
before I get back towhere Iwant to be,” Phelps said. Yet even the hard-driving
Bowman acknowledges that Phelps’s highly unscientific and maddening approach to reduc- ing his training loadmight actu- ally help himreturn to top form in time for the 2012 Summer Games in London. Phelps offers the most prominent example of a growingmovement among the world’s top swimmers. As swim- mers continue their profession- al careers well beyond college, the older generation is unable or unwilling to tolerate the sport’s extraordinary training demands day after day and year after year. And so, with their coaches’
sanction or without, they don’t. Some, such as five-time
OlympianDara Torres, two-time Olympian Natalie Coughlin and formerOlympic sprint star Gary Hall Jr., disappear fromthe pool for a year or years at a time for physical and mental refresh- ment. Others, such as Jason Lezak, Ryan Lochte and Aaron Peirsol, take long breaks after major championships. Phelps, 25, has taken time off in random chunks, with no apparent plan inmind. “They’re no longer college
kids,” said Jon Urbanchek, the former coach at the University ofMichiganwho this year joined a USA Swimming post-graduate training center in Fullerton. “They’re no longer like sheep, following one another.” Bowman, Urbanchek and
other coaches say they know they can’t force adult swimmers to train like children, yet swim- ming is not a sport that readily tolerates shortcuts. Brett Favre might be able to start a pre- season game for the Minnesota Vikings just days after arriving to training camp, but when swimmers don’t train, they usu- ally go slower. Even so, Coughlin and Lezak have done surprising- ly well on reduced workloads, and Phelps managed to domi- nate two individual events here. Experience, clearly, counts for something. The problemfor coaches and
MLS, Philadelphia at D.C. United » Comcast SportsNet; Spanish WDCN (87.7 FM)
PRESEASON NFL 8 p.m.
Minnesota at San Francisco » WRC (Channel 4),WBAL (Channel 11)
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Ramstein AFB (Germany) vs. Nuevo Laredo (Mexico) » ESPN Chitre (Panama) vs. TBA » ESPN
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athletes: There is no proven methodology for training post- graduate swimmers that strikes
SUNDAY, AUGUST 22, 2010
CHRISTINNE MUSCHI/REUTERS
Michael Phelps was more than 11 seconds under his best time in the 400-meter individual medley. “It’s very hard for me when I
a tested-out balance between rest and work. Coaches say they are learning to manage their agingmultiplemedalists as they go, crossing their fingers that they are making the right deci- sions with abbreviated practic- es, uncustomary patience and new strategies. Phelps and his peers are, in effect, test cases. “Nobody knows what they
are doing,” Bowman said. “We are in uncharted territory.” USA Swimming has recently
invested millions in developing a trio of post-graduate training centers, one at the North Balti- more Aquatic Club where Phelps trains, and others in Ful- lerton and Charlotte, N.C. Those facilities are designed to give swimmers who don’t wish to continue to train with their col- lege or club teams a place to go. Great Falls’ Kate Ziegler left her longtime coach, Ray Benecki, two months ago to join the Fullerton post-graduate group. As the London Games ap-
proach, Bowman said, he plans to take a less rigorous approach than leading up to the 2008 Summer Games in Beijing, but he’s not sure how it will all go and whether it will work. If the amount of training required for Phelps to win eight medals in Beijing registered as an eight, Bowman said, he forced Phelps to put out an 11 before that Olympics. But he said the next two yearsmight be a seven. Bowman is so meticulous
about Phelps’s workout history that he possesses an extensive written record of every training session Phelps has completed for years, stacks of handwritten workout sheets piled in card- board boxes. Bowman has been tested by Phelps’s insouciance, which he said was particularly prominent early this year.
PANPACIFICCHAMPIONSHIPSNOTEBOOK Lochte falls short of 200-meter IM world record
American wins gold, but misses mark by 0.33 seconds
BY AMY SHIPLEY
irvine, calif. — Ryan Lochte made a runat hisworld record in the 200-meter individualmedley in the final at the Pan Pacific Championships on Saturday, but fell just 0.33 seconds short as he won the goldmedal in a race that MichaelPhelps electedto skip. Lochte wanted not only to
only from Comcast.
back up his victory over Phelps twoweeks ago in the event at the U.S. championships, but also to become the first swimmer to break aworldrecordsince super- suitswere bannedinJanuary. Lochte touched the wall in 1
minute 54.43 seconds, easily top- ping U.S. teammate Tyler Clary, who won his third silver medal this week with his finish in 1:57.61. “That’s absolutely amazing, to
come that close to that time non- suited,” Clary said. “I’m hugely proudofhimfor it.” The event was Lochte’s last
here, and it gave him his sixth goldmedal, themost of any com- petitor. “IknewIhadit inmysight,”he
said about the world record ef- fort.But “I thinkallof theswims I had earlier this weekmademe a little tired toward the end of the race.” Clary had a chance to bump
Phelps off next summer’s world championship teamin the event if he went under Phelps’s time of 1:55.94 from the U.S. champion- ships.
Phelps,whowatchedfrombe-
hind a barrier just feet from the starting line, was scheduled to compete in the event, but pulled out Saturdaymorning.His coach Bob Bowman hewanted to focus onthe 4x100medley relay. Lochte said he was disap-
pointed Phelps chose not to com- pete. “I was just going out doing
what Ido, racingandhavingfun,” he said. “I wanted to prove to everyonethat [myvictory]wasn’t a fluke atnationals.”
Hardy’s comeback American Jessica Hardy won
her third medal of the week in a triumphant return to major in- ternational competition. Hardy claimed the title in the 50 free- style with her finish in 24.63, topping U.S. teammate Amanda Weir (24.70).
Hardy missed the 2008 Sum-
mer Games after testing positive for a steroid, but two arbitration panels determined the positive result was caused by a contami- natedsupplement. “I’mhaving a blast here,”Har-
dy said. “The whole past two years have been really hard. . . . I’m very happy with where I am now, and I’m looking forward to continuing to improve.” . . . Nathan Adrian backed up his
surprise victory in the 100 free- style final earlier this week with another gold in the 50 free. Adri- an earned his third goldmedal of themeetwithhis victory in21.55, edging Brazil’s Cesar Cielo (21.57). . . . Katie Hoff, who posted the
10th fastest time (2:13.21) in the morning’s heats, did not advance to the final.
shipleya@washpost.com
can’t follow a plan,” Bowman said. “For Michael, I have a five-minute plan. For other my other [swimmers], I have a four- year plan. “This year, it’s been one foot
on the boat and one foot on the dock, and how far can you go?” Bowman said he wonders
whether he shouldn’t have just toldPhelps to take anentire year off after winning eight gold medals in the 2008 Summer Games. Phelps has shown up for about 40 percent of the year’s workouts, he said, and has only come to practice consistently sinceMay. When he did show up, Bow-
man made Phelps work mostly on his butterfly stroke, because Phelps’s technical mastery of it makes it relatively easy tomain- tain — especially over shorter distances. That, perhaps, ex- plains how Phelps won his only two individual goldmedals here in the 100-meter butterfly and the 200 butterfly. The time he posted in the preliminary round of the 400 individualmedley fell more than 11 seconds under his best time in the event. He dropped out of the 200 medley shortly before the heats Satur- day.
Phelps said he has beenmoti-
vated by this week’s lackluster performances, but time will tell howmuch. “I really can’t do anything
now,” Phelps said Friday. “The real test of my motivation is going to be when I get back in the pool. That’s where we’re really going to see how much it motivatedme.” Fellow swimmers and USA
Swimming officials have shrugged off Phelps’s lapses, pointing out that he has still posted excellent times in some
races — his leadoff leg in the 4x100 freestyle relaywould have won him the gold in the 100 freestyle final — while noting that this summer offered the least significant competition of the four-year Olympic cycle. “He’s having the appropriate
meet under the current circum- stances,” said Mark Schubert, the National Team Director for USA Swimming. Schubert was asked how he
would have handled a collegian who refused to show up to daily practice when he coached at the University of Southern Califor- nia.
He would have said, “You
need to turn in your scholarship or come to practice,” he said. “That’s appropriate for an 18- year-old. “But for our older swimmers,”
he added, “we are reinventing the sport.” While Phelps relaxed, his big-
gest rival, Ryan Lochte, said he worked harder over the last seven months than he ever has, and his results here demon- strate the difference. Lochte, who took Phelps’s world record in the 200 medley last year, entered Saturday night’s finals with five goldmedals fromthese championships and a chance to claimonemore. Lochte, not Phelps, has been
thismeet’smale star. “There is no doubt this is
good,” Bowman said. “The way [Phelps] is talking now, I knowI have his attention. That has been the most positive part of a frustrating year. Even if he could intellectualize some things, he didn’t care. Now he cares.” Added Bowman: “I’mtired of
hearing he’s out of shape. We know. Shut up about it. Do something about it.”
shipleya@washpost.com
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