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E-mail StoryWoodward's chance to make Olympic team fades
| Thursday, Jul 3 2008 10:21 PM
Last Updated: Monday, Jul 7 2008 11:12 AM
OMAHA, Neb. — On a night when a crowd of 13,011 made swimming history as the largest audience for a swim meet on American soil, Bakersfield's Gabe Woodward's dream of making his second Olympic team basically came to an end with an eighth-place finish in the 100-meter freestyle. The crowd at the Olympic Swim Trials witnessed no world records, but a few surprises.
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Bakersfield Swim Club's Gabe Woodward is shown at the start of the 100-meter freestyle at the US Olympic Trials. Woodward, a member of the 2004 Olympic team, failed to qualify for the Beijing Games this summer.
Bakersfield Swim Club's Gabe Woodward is shown prior to the start of the 100-meter freestyle at the US Olympic Trials.
Woodward's time of 48.93 was his second fastest ever, but it was 13 hundredths of a second behind the sixth-place spot, which would have gotten him on the team headed to Beijing.
"I was a little deep on my dive and I was a little slow in my turn," Woodward noted, "so there was the .14 that I needed."
The 100 free was won by Garrett Weber-Gale in a time of 47.92. Weber-Gale, 22, and Jason Lezak, 32, will represent the U.S. in the Olympics, which will start Aug. 8.
In what has been a record-breaking trials for attendance and speed, the men's 100 free produced the fastest times for the event ever assembled in one race.
"So I lost in the fastest heat ever," Woodward laughed, "but it was a real honor to be a part of that field."
Although Woodward swims the 50-meter free starting today, his chances of finishing in the top two are quite remote. Woodward's Bakersfield Swim Club teammate, Joe Whittington, will also compete today in the 50 free.
Woodward, who works full-time as a financial adviser, said "I couldn't be happier to go out in the way I did. The Lord obviously has something different for me than being on the Beijing team."
The demands between having a job, being a husband and father of two young children "has been a huge balancing act. I am looking forward to hanging with Staci (his wife), Reese and Hudson (his two children)."
"It has been an incredible journey," said Keith Moore, head coach of the Bakersfield Swim Club. "Gabe came to me two years ago and told me he could swim a 48 (in the 100 free), I believed him and I got out of his way. I got in his way a couple of times, but I had to learn to get out of his way. It has been a great honor to have him swim for me."
"If Keith wasn't my coach in Bakersfield," Woodward said, "I wouldn't have been swimming, because of the flexibility. I had 90 minutes a day to train ... and I don't think 91 minutes would have gotten me to Beijing."
In other events during the evening, Dara Torres, 41, swam a 53.76 in the women's 100-meter free to qualify second for tonight's finals. Natalie Coughlin, the American record holder in the event (53.39) was the leading qualifier in 53.66. "I told her (Dara) that right now I am the oldest on the (Olympic) team," Coughlin commented after touching out Torres in her heat.
In the biggest surprise of the entire meet, Scott Spann won the 200-meter breaststroke in 2:09.97, while American record holder and former world record holder Brendan Hansen took fourth and didn't qualify for the team.
The other final of the evening saw Elaine Breeden win the 200-meter butterfly in 2:06.75, the fifth fastest time in the world this year.