Japan turns out lots of good swimmers. Men like Kosuke Nakajima, who holds the world record in the 100- and 200-breast. I have swum against some of their Olympians when they were still club swimmers.

The rest of the world has some good swimmers, too.

Libby Lenton is one.

-Libby Lenton/Trickett is from Townsville, Queensland, Australia and is 23 years old

-Trickett is swimming the 50-, 100-free, and 100 butterfly, three of the sprint events in Beijing.

-Trickett took the bronze medal in 2004 Olympics in the 50 freestyle, Gold in the 4×100 freestyle relay

-Trickett was the first to break the world record in the 100 free set by Dutch sprint champion, Inge de Bruijin (2000 Olympics) in March of 2004. However, Trickett did not even make it in to the Finals (top in the event in the Olympics that summer. The winner in the event was Jodie Henry also from Australia breaking Trickett’s World record. Trickett however took back the record in 2006 and has been the leading female sprinter in the world.

-Henry appears not to be competing in this Olympic. Trickett is ranked 1^st in all three event listed above, holding current world records in 50 and 100 freestyle

-The Australian female relay teams look very promising with Trickett as one of the big contributors to the Aussie relays.

Guest Blogger - Micah Belew