On Starry Night, Torres Shines

By Winning 100-Meter Freestyle, 41-Year-Old Qualifies for Her Fifth Olympics

OMAHA, July 4 -- In one moment, the most incredible development Friday night at the U.S. Olympic swimming trials was, indisputably, Aaron Peirsol stretching out a seemingly endless arm and touching the wall ahead of Ryan Lochte. Last year, Lochte took the world record in the 200-meter backstroke from Peirsol. On Friday, Peirsol tied that mark to the hundredth of a second, beating Lochte by a fraction of a blink.

Minutes later, that moment was replaced by the pure dominance of Michael Phelps, from whom it is hard to look away. For the second time here, he raced Lochte. And for the second time, the mellow Floridian pushed Phelps to a world record, this one in the 200 individual medley. Consider Phelps's peerlessness -- he has swum four events here, won them all and set two world marks -- and it's hard to imagine he could be outshone.

Yet within 10 minutes of that finish, Dara Torres put her 41-year-old hand on that same wall at the Qwest Center pool. She looked skyward, where the results of the women's 100 freestyle were displayed. Elation? No. Confusion.

"I'm like, 'What does that say?' " she said. "Then I heard the announcer, and then I could kind of see it, like, blurry. But they need to make those numbers a little bigger for people my age."

On a dizzying night that could have belonged to Peirsol or Phelps -- or, for that matter, Lochte, who performed the evening's most difficult task of spurring two men to two different records -- Torres stood out. By beating the favored Natalie Coughlin, finishing in 53.78 seconds to Coughlin's 53.83, Torres qualified for her fifth Olympic team.

"I'm ecstatic," Torres said. "I can't believe it."

Phelps, Peirsol and Coughlin could do almost anything in Beijing, from winning multiple golds to lowering world records. They are, though, indisputably in their primes. Because of that, Friday's stage was left to Torres -- or, Phelps said, "As I call her: my mom."

"I like to refer to it as a big sister," Torres said later. Whatever the label, the performance must resonate with every athlete here, from 12-year-old Grace Carlson of Oregon -- the youngest -- to the king of the sport, Phelps.

"Forty-one, right?" Phelps said. "Forty-one -- with a kid? It's extremely impressive."

Torres's first Olympics came in 1984 as a 17-year-old. On Friday, she showed not only that she could make the team, but that she could add to her career total of nine medals once in Beijing.

"I'm shocked," she said. Perhaps because her mere participation here, let alone winning races, involves special stretching coaches and elongated warm-down periods in the pool after each race. Even in a group of 1,200 focused athletes, Torres's pre- and post-race routines stand out. "You can't believe it if you see it," said Phelps's coach, Bob Bowman.

"I trained with her," said 12-time Olympic medalist Jenny Thompson, 35, who competed with Torres in 1992 and 2000. "I know she's compulsive about training and nutrition and sleep and doing all the right things, so I think age is sort of irrelevant."