ryk neethling
Ryk Neethling
Photo: ©Dan Mitchell/pullbuoy
If one ever wanted to gauge the determination with which South African Olympic Champion Ryk Neethling approaches his swimming, then there's no need to look any further that the later months of 2000. Neethling had just recorded a 5th placed finish over 1500m recording a time of 15:00.43 which still ranks him in the all time top 25 swimmers for the event. It was a repeat of his placing in Atlanta four years earlier and in the intervening years he had collected silvers at Commonwealth and Pan Pacific level, being beaten each time only by the incomparable Grant Hackett.
However the 2000 Olympics were to be the end of the line for his distance ambitions. "After Sydney I just thought that 15:00 was as fast as Ryk Neethling was ever going to go for 1500m and I wanted a new challenge" he says now. That challenge was to reinvent himself as a world class sprinter, and one which few would argue he has been able to achieve.
There was, however, a solid base to start from. Displaying a range of versatility that even Hackett struggles to match, in 2000 the South African record stood to Neethling at 49.70, well within the bounds of world class 100m freestyling, but results books now show that was only the beginning.
Switching focus at his training base at the University of Arizona under the direction of coaches Frank Busch and Rick Demont, Neethling chipped away at his best times in the sprints, culminating with an astonishing 47.20 split at the end of South Africa's gold medal winning relay in Athens. His first global medals over the shorter distances came this year with World Championship bronzes in both the 100m and 200m freestyle in Montreal, where he reduced his 100m best to a superb 48.34. That swim is good enough for 8th on the all time list while his 200m performance of 1:46.63 has only ever been bettered by 6 swimmers.
Neethling is now back in his native South Africa, training with Busch in Johannesburg, as he prepares for his Commonwealth assault in Melbourne. Moving back home has had it's own problems, with the 28 year old a national hero. "I'm a lot more busy over there; I'm always surprised when I swim fast because I'm always flying all over the country and doing all kinds of sponsorship stuff and I'm just not used to that".
Nonetheless his training regimen has remained fairly consistent with his work in the US. "We aren't doing much different, just a few bits here and there. Mainly I'm just learning that I'm getting older and my body's changing so I have to realise that I'm not eighteen any more and I recover slower and all those kind of things." Another advantage of the switch to the shorter events.
As far as his Melbourne programme goes, his showdown in the 100m freestyle with compatriot Roland Schoeman, who with Michael Klim are the only Commonwealth swimmers to have beaten Neethling's best, shapes as a highlight, but he may yet add other events to his repertoire. "My fly was really good in Durban [at the World Cup meet] so we'll see what happens. Hopefully I'll swim some fly, particularly the 50m. It's the same day as the 800 free relay and the 100m freestyle final so we'll see how the programme works out."
One thing's for sure; Neethling has been in blistering form on the world cup circuit, recording his 17th successive victory at the Sydney round, and will go to Melbourne as a big medal contender. Indeed with Schoeman rejecting approaches from Qatar, he could well be primed to mount the top of the medal podium for the 4x100m freestyle. For many, the possibility of a break from likely Australian dominance will give them ample cause to cheer the Springboks home.