Cody Simpson’s one final chance on securing a ticket to Paris after failing to qualify for freestyle final
Cody Simpson will be putting all his efforts into the 100m butterfly to secure his ticket to Paris, after he failed to lock in a finals spot in the hotly contested 100m freestyle at trials.
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Cody Simpson’s chances of making the Paris Olympics are hanging by a thread after he just missed out on a place in the 100 metres final at the Australian trials, leaving the former pop star with one last fling at making the team.
Simpson needed to finish in the top eight in the 100m freestyle to qualify for Thursday night’s final but finished 10th overall after posting a time of 49.04 seconds in his morning heat.
He remains first reserve for the because the ninth-placed swimmer, Germany’s Josha Salchow, is not permitted to compete in the final, but was 0.14 behind the last qualifier, the 200m winner Max Guiliani.
Simpson was never really expected to make the team in the 100m free because his best event is 100m butterfly so it was a bittersweet moment to get so close with the top six from the final likely to get picked for the 4x100m freestyle relay at Paris.
“I’m feeling pretty good. I did the best I could out there,” he said.
“It’s a stacked field in that 100m free so I knew it was going to be a bit iffy trying to get into that final so it was a good warm up for the 100m fly.
“It’s not my main event, it’s sort of the second most important to me but I love the freestyle so I thought I’d get in and have a crack.”
To qualify for Paris, Simpson needs to finish in the top two in Saturday’s 100m butterfly and make the insanely difficult qualifying time of 51.17 - which is well under his career best time of 51.67.
He faces an uphill task but said he has trained to give himself the best shot.
“I had a really good last six months of training, just absolutely flogging myself so ready to hopefully get some good results this week,” he said.
“Swimming’s tricky. You can train for a long time for really marginal gains, microscopic sometimes.
“I had a really great shift the first two years and just sort of been banging at the brick wall trying to get that next level.
“And the faster you get, the harder it is to keep getting faster so it’s just going to be about trying to see if I can put something together on the night.
“The qualifying time is about exactly half a second faster than my current PB (personal best), which is not much but we just have a go.”
Kyle Chalmers set the fastest qualifying time for the 100m free winning his heat in 48.39, but will need to go much quicker in the final.
William Yang was second quickest, followed by Flynn Southam, Jamie Jack, the brother of Shayna, while Kai Taylor, the son of Hayley Lewis was sixth.
“It was good,” Chalmers said.
“I probably didn’t execute to the best of my ability but I just did what I needed to do to get through.”
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Originally published as Cody Simpson’s one final chance on securing a ticket to Paris after failing to qualify for freestyle final
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