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U.S. OLYMPIC SWIM TRIALS

July 3, 2016

Nathan Adrian

Omaha, Nebraska

THE MODERATOR: We are joined by 50 and 100 Meter Freestyle champion, Nathan Adrian, headed to his third Olympic Games. Nathan, recap from your perspective how things went this week.

NATHAN ADRIAN: Things went well. We came in here with a goal to put some guys on the Olympic Team, and I think we achieved that goal.

Q. Nathan, can you talk about the dynamic that you have with Anthony and Cullen? It seems like especially in the 50 there are just three of you that are so elite; there is always one person that is left out, but you're also so much older than a lot of the sprinters, and you have been able to hold the younger kids off, which is not the case in a lot of the other events. Talk about the dynamics between the three of you.
NATHAN ADRIAN: The dynamics are great. Anthony and Cullen are the nicest, most genuine guys that I know. You would struggle to find anybody who has anything bad to say about those guys. It's hard. Olympic Trials are -- I guess I forget about it but how difficult it is to -- because you want to see your friends do well, you know?

And here we are and you have to compete against them, because that's the nature of the game. I love to see when those guys do well, but I also train really hard to try to swim fast to represent Team USA, and if there are three of us there one of us has to be left out. I guess we have a good, common understanding of that, and despite that we can still be pretty good friends outside the pool.

Q. (No microphone.)
NATHAN ADRIAN: Being older? We know that! Well, I think the 50 certainly has -- there's a couple things, maybe first of all, like strength is certainly a factor and as you're older, you know, we jokingly call it "old man strength" but it's a thing.

Then also I think just having the experience to know how to perform at this kind of stage in a 50 Free final. All three of us have been lucky enough to be on several National Teams and in these kinds of positions before, so we know what to expect and how to compete for these spots perform.

Some of the younger guys got that experience through that event last night, and I'm sure next time that that comes around they will be that much better.

Q. How much attention were you paying to the Olympics in 2000 when Anthony tied Gary Hall?
NATHAN ADRIAN: That was -- my first Olympics that I actually remember was 1996, but my first Olympics that you paid attention to was definitely that team in 2000 and Tony was -- you know, I was a Gary Hall, Jr. fan. Not to say that I wasn't an Anthony Ervin fan, but I was a young kid and excited to see Gary do all the fun stuff that he was doing, but Anthony was certainly an inspiration to me in seeing what he did at such a young age.

At that point I was eight years younger than him and man that was one of the first times I was putting the numbers together saying how many seconds do I need to drop per year, at that point I could still drop a second per year, but what do I need to do to try to put myself in a position like he put himself in.

Q. If you grew up liking Gary Hall, have you ever been attempted to imitate any of his outlandish pre-race maneuvers?
NATHAN ADRIAN: No, because I think the cool thing about Gary and even with Tony, is that they embrace who they are as individuals, and for me to do anything like that would be me imitating Gary and not me being me. We're going to have to wait a little longer until we get another showman like a Gary Hall, Jr.

Q. I think for the last Summer Games the US has won more swimming medals than any other country. What dynamic does that bring to the team with expectations knowing that it's been such a big part of the Olympic experience and success for so long?
NATHAN ADRIAN: You know, there's always going to be a couple different ways to approach that with a team as big as Team USA, right, in that some people react to those expectations in a positive way and they can use that as motivation.

Michael is a guy who can deal with expectations better than literally anybody in the world. Then there are some other people who don't necessarily latch on to that and they take that as maybe a little bit more anxiety. I think we're going to have to navigate how we present this to people and, you know, I think guys like just because I know him from practice every day, a guy like Ryan Murphy, he's a guy who knows how to step up to the plate and we can say, hey, man, team USA can really use some medals out of you, and he would be like, right on, let's do this. I love it! It's not something that we're, like -- it's in our face, but it's something I love to track just because it's Team USA, and it's swimming at the Olympics and it's something I certainly take pride in being part of USA Swimming.

Q. It used to be that the 50 and the 100 were definitely the glamour events of swimming. Do you feel that's changed during Michael's reign since those weren't the events that you won the gold medals in?
NATHAN ADRIAN: That's a good question. I don't necessarily -- I think maybe 50 and 100 are still where they were before, but Michael has elevated the other events, too, to something that's incredible, because he can do what he can do.

I know certainly a lot of French people will be watching that 50 Free final. I know a lot of Australian people will be watching that 100 Free final, so on the world stage the 50 and the 100 are certainly still pretty big events.

Q. So in some respects do you think your renown might be more in France and Australia because they are way more interested in your events than maybe people in the United States?
NATHAN ADRIAN: I think that's a matter of statistic and how you count them, because the US has a pretty big population. If you take percentage of population maybe it would be bigger over there, but I think we have people who are excited about the Olympics, so if you look at total viewership maybe it's in the United States' favor. I don't know.

Q. (No microphone.)
NATHAN ADRIAN: Name recognition? It's not something I pay attention to. I don't know. I couldn't give you a good answer, sorry.

Q. Are you fairly comfortable you will be able to drop time in both events, and do you think you will need to to medal?
NATHAN ADRIAN: You know, that's been the plan, but that's not saying that things haven't gone to plan before, right? But certainly the goal coming into this meet was to go some times that were good enough to make the team and still have a little left to go a little faster, and we looked at our races and we've kind of figured out the different avenues I think that we want to clean up and where we want to get faster. So, yeah, I would be -- who wants to sit here and be like, "Well, that's all I got! That's it!"

Let's try to be faster and be better!

Q. Do you have any sense at all of how Katie might be making distance freestyle cooler than it was before? Any evidence?
NATHAN ADRIAN: Totally.

Q. What kind?
NATHAN ADRIAN: Yeah, we just all love to watch her swim! I think that's one of the those events that you just -- you look at the back of your credential and you're like, oh, sweet, 400 Free today, I'm going to make a point to check it out, or in the warm-down pool you can see the screen up there, so you certainly -- you just know something special is -- there is always something special that could happen if Katie jumps in the water.

Q. Was there a time you would not maybe may as close attention to the longer races?
NATHAN ADRIAN: Well, if there's a Team USA athlete that was in there that is a medal contender, I think I always pay attention. Like the 800 Free is a little tough, because it's literally right before the 50 so that one is a little tough and that will always be tough for me, but, you know, if there is not a Team USA person in there and they're not in a race to snag a medal, then maybe not as much. That's certainly something that she has had a big impact on.

Q. If I remember correctly you had a very strong distance background at one time, so I can't believe that you didn't pay some attention to distance events!
NATHAN ADRIAN: Yeah, certainly I understand the grind. It's been over 10 years now since I've been doing that stuff, so that is long enough for me to maybe forget what the pain feels like and to understand what some pretty serious acidosis feels like from producing lactic acid. But, no, don't for a second think it's me saying I don't appreciate the distance events.

It's all family, right? It's all swimming and it's fun to see different guys doing what they do best, and I love watching Connor who's actually one of my favorite racers to watch. Him and Katie have the same absolute racer mentality. At the end of the race they're never going to give up, and that's one of the coolest things to watch because you can feel that and you can see that and you can see that through their training and how it manifests itself in their race. I enjoy watching that.

THE MODERATOR: Thanks, Nathan.

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