Switching to a regular racing suit for the first time in three days of competition, Lochte salvaged an otherwise underwhelming weekend performance by winning the 200 IM and setting a new meet record at the Charlotte Grand Prix on Sunday.

Ryan Lochte reacts to winning the men's 200m IM final during the 2012 Charlotte UltraSwim Grand Prix at Mecklenburg County Aquatic Center on May 13, 2012 in Charlotte, North Carolina. (Photo by Streeter Lecka/Getty Images)

Lochte had failed to earn a medal in his other five events wearing a brief, but closed strong by beating Conor Dwyer and Eric Shanteau with a time of 1 minute, 57.63 seconds. It was a pleasing finish for Lochte, who failed to qualify for the finals of the 100-meter freestyle earlier in the day after placing 33rd in the preliminaries.

“It felt good to actually have a decent swim,” he said.

Lochte’s previous best finish of the weekend was sixth place in the 200 free. He was seventh in the 400 IM and eighth in the 100 backstroke. He failed to qualify for the main heat in the 50 backstroke and pulled out of the finals.

The world record holder in the 200 IM, Lochte began to pull away in the third leg of the race with a strong breaststroke. He was never challenged down the stretch beating Dwyer by nearly two seconds. Dwyer finished in 1:59.29 and Shanteau touched the wall in 2:00.46. Sebastian Rousseau finished a distant fourth.

Lochte said overall he was “disappointed” with his effort at the meet.

“I hate to lose,” Lochte said. “I like winning. I mean it didn’t happen but I had to keep reminding myself this isn’t the big picture. The big picture is the trials and Olympics. I just have to keep focused for that, keep moving forward. People won’t remember this meet. They’ll remember the trials and the Olympics. So even though I wanted to do well at this meet, it doesn’t affect me. I know that it will be there when the time is right.”

Lochte used this meet as a training tool.

He swam six races, four more than his main rival, Michael Phelps. He also wore a brief for his other races, but his coach Greg Troy recommended he switch to a regular suit for the 200 IM — perhaps in an effort to bolster his confidence.

“After my swims this weekend I think coach realized, you know what, you have to have a good one getting out of this meet,” Lochte said. “So I put the suit on and had a decent swim.”

While some swimmers are beginning to taper for the Olympic Trials in June, Lochte said he won’t begin that for another couple of weeks.

Lochte said he was pretty tired coming in and is even more exhausted leaving Charlotte.

He plans to return to Florida this week to continue training, knowing exactly where he needs to improve to capture gold in the London Games.

“I’m going to focus on speed, doing little things like my turns and my starts — just speed,” Lochte said. “Right now I have no speed. I have a lot of endurance and I have a good background right now in my training and it’s time to get ready.”

Phelps, the 14-time Olympic gold medalist, beat Lochte in both events they raced on Friday and Saturday. Phelps came in second in the 200 freestyle and 200 butterfly. He did not participate in any events Sunday.

Charlotte native Ricky Berens, who defeated Phelps and Lochte in the 200 freestyle Friday, captured his second gold medal of the meet Sunday by winning the 100 free in 49.07 seconds.

Although Berens said he felt “sloppy” in the race, he was ultimately pleased with his time, edging out Anthony Ervin (49.61) and Australian Matthew Targett (49.65) for the win while earning a measure of respect — as well as confidence — heading to Omaha next month for the U.S. Olympic Trials.

Berens feels his best is yet to come.

“I’m feeling very confident and this is a huge step in the road toward Omaha,” Berens said. “I’m swimming times that are the fastest I’ve swam in a long time and we’re nowhere near our taper, so to be putting up these times is exciting. I’m having fun and racing fast.”

In other men’s events, Ryan Murphy won the 200 backstroke with a time of 1:58.09 and Chad La Tourette captured the 1500 freestyle in a 15:06.73.

The featured women’s race was the 100-meter freestyle and it was an incredibly tight battle with Lia Neal edging Jessica Hardy by one one-hundredth of a second, finishing in 54.35. Natalie Coughlin, an 11-time Olympic medalist who hopes to become the most decorated female swimmer in history this summer at the London Games, finished third at 54.59.

Hardy finished the meet with four medals — two gold and two silver.

In the women’s 200 IM, Caitlin Leverenz defeated Ariana Kukors and established a new meet record with a time of 2:10.25, beating her time in the preliminaries by more than four seconds. Kukors finished in 2:11.09, while Elizabeth Pelton was third at 2:11.87.

Pelton rebounded to win the 200 backstroke in 2:09.41, edging out Stephanie Proud and Dominique Bouchard.

Fifteen-year-old Kathleen Ledecky won the 800 freestyle going away in a meet record time of 8:25.85, the fourth fastest time in the world this year. Ledecky pulled away early and was never challenged, beating Gillian Ryan (8:36.56) and Elizabeth Beisel (8:37.40) by more than 10 seconds.

CHARLOTTE: Fans scream for Michael Phelps' attention as he makes his way to compete in the men's 200-meter butterfly finals. Phelps took second place in the event. (AP Photo/Bob Leverone)

CHARLOTTE — For Michael Phelps, it’s time to head to the mountains.

The 14-time Olympic gold medalist showed he still has some work to do before the London Games, settling for another runner-up finish at the Charlotte Grand Prix on Saturday. He was edged by China’s Wu Peng in the 200-meter butterfly, losing to the same swimmer who ended Phelps’ long winning streak in one of his signature events a year ago in Michigan.

Phelps doesn’t sound worried.

“Sure, I sure hate to lose,” he said. “But when it comes down to it, if I’m able to see where I’m at, see what I need to do and change, that’s all I really need to get out of it.”

Phelps was second all the way, trailing Wu at the first turn, then falling behind Sebastien Rousseau through the middle two laps of the race. Wu, who was fourth in the 200 fly at Beijing, showed an impressive finishing kick, passing Rousseau and Phelps to win in 1 minute, 56.69 seconds. Phelps was next at 1:56.87, while Rousseau slipped to third in 1:57.54.

“I know this is not the Olympic trials, this is not the Olympic Games,” Phelps said. “It’s a stepping stone heading in right direction for the end result. You’ve heard me say that so many times, but that’s the truth. These are little things along the way — I like to call them quizzes — to really see what I need to improve on.”

Phelps competed in only two races at Charlotte, also finishing second in the 200 freestyle. He will swim just one more meet, a minor event in Texas, before the U.S. Olympic trials in Omaha in late June.

For much of the next six weeks, he’ll be locked away in the mountains of Colorado, just Phelps and coach Bob Bowman, training in high altitude and fine-tuning his strokes without any unnecessary distractions.

“I hope I come out alive,” Phelps joked.

But he knows it’s the right thing to do, a necessary step to ensure his fourth — and what he insists will be his final — Olympics provides a fitting capper to his brilliant career. He still needs to make some subtle improvements in his technique, and his laser-like focus is not quite where it needs to be. For instance, he heard the crowd cheering him on in the race and had to remind himself not to go out faster than he wanted. Then, on the finishing lap, he got a bit out of whack and found himself counting strokes in his head “for some reason.”

“I’m within striking distance of where I need to be,” Phelps insisted. “That’s pretty much the reason why we decided to just go to Colorado Springs and stay there until the trials. We do get a lot of work done when we go there. I know that. It’s a tough place to be in and train in for six weeks. But at this point, that’s something I need and something I know that’s really going to help me. Bob and I talked about it and decided that’s the best decision for us to really have the best shot at being able to accomplish our goals. We’re literally locked away from everything and nobody can get to us. All we do is train, eat, sleep and swim. We do nothing else.”

Wu, who’s made the 200 fly finals at the last two Olympics but has yet to win a medal, knows that Phelps will be a lot tougher to beat in London than he was in Charlotte.

“I was satisfied with my performance,” he said. “I think Michael is not feeling good yet. I was just lucky.”

Wu is realistic about his own goals, knowing that he has the misfortune of excelling in an event that Phelps has won at the last two Olympics and will be heavily favored to take again at these games.

“If I just get any medal in London, I will be happy,” Wu said. “Everyone wants to beat Michael because Michael is the fastest swimmer in the world. But I really just want to be top three.”

CHARLOTTE: Michael Phelps prepares for the 200 meter freestyle swimming event in the 2012 Charlotte UltraSwim Grand Prix in Charlotte, N.C., Friday, May 11, 2012. (Photo by AP Photo/Chuck Burton)

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Michael Phelps easily beat Ryan Lochte in their last race before the U.S. Olympic trials.

Don’t read too much into the results.

Heck, Phelps didn’t win either.

Ricky Berens beat them both to the wall in the 200-meter freestyle at the Charlotte Grand Prix on Friday night, touching in a relatively slow time of 1 minute, 47.32 seconds. Phelps finished second in 1:48.01, while Lochte was far back in sixth place at 1:49.70.

“We’re all doing different training,” Phelps said. “That’s how (Lochte) has always done it. I’m sure that’s what he’s going to do this year. He’s somebody who’s a very tough racer and, at the right time, he’ll be there when it counts.”

Lochte, in fact, put himself at a disadvantage before the race even started by going with a brief instead of a jammer suit like the one worn by Phelps. Also, the Floridian is swimming a much more extensive program in Charlotte than his top rival, who has only one more event, the 200 butterfly, before he heads to the U.S. Olympic Committee media summit in Dallas.

Later in the evening, Lochte finished seventh in the grueling 400 individual medley. He’s got several more events in Charlotte before he shuts it down on Sunday, heading back to the sunshine state to get in some serious training before the trials in Omaha, which begin in late June.

“None of this is going to matter,” said Gregg Troy, Lochte’s coach. “No one is going to care what happened in Charlotte in another month and a half or two months. So, we’re pretty comfortable.”

Phelps is planning to swim at only one more meet before the Olympic trials. He’ll be spending most of his time in the mountains of Colorado, fine-tuning his conditioning at altitude.

Berens certainly knows that both Phelps and Lochte will be going much faster when they get to Omaha. At last year’s world championships, Lochte won the gold with a showing of 1:44.44, edging Phelps by 35-hundredths of a second.

Berens hasn’t come close to those sort of times without benefit of the rubberized suits that have since been banned by FINA, the world governing body. The best he can hope for, it would seem, is to go fast enough at trials to earn a spot on the 800 free relay.

“I have one of the hardest events in the country,” he conceded. “I’ve got Ryan Lochte and Michael Phelps, who are the two fastest guys in the world and the toughest competition. As long as I’m on the relay with those two guys, I’ll be glad to be on their on their team. As long as I’m part of that relay and winning gold for the U.S., I’m happy.”

All eyes were on Phelps and Lochte as they headed to the blocks, with nearly everyone in the overflow crowd snapping pictures of them with cellphones and tablets. But Berens, a native of Charlotte, had plenty of supporters too.

His plan was to get off to a quick start and try to hold on. It worked out just fine.

Berens was about a half-body length ahead of Phelps at the first turn and never gave up the advantage. Phelps hoped to get a powerful finishing kick off his last turn, but he had trouble judging the wall because of a bulkhead that hangs over the end of the pool. He mistimed his flip, didn’t get the push he wanted and couldn’t quite catch up to the leader.

“I wanted to nail that third wall. I knew that was going to be the difference in the race,” Phelps said. “He probably got me by a couple of tenths on that wall. With 15 or 20 meters to go, I kind of felt like I was reeling him in a little bit. I just kind of ran out of room. I didn’t set myself up to run him down at the right spot. Hopefully, next time.”

Phelps wasn’t sure what to expect after a sluggish showing in the morning preliminaries, when he managed only the fifth-fastest time at 1:51.20.

“I felt awful,” Phelps said. “That was probably the worst I’ve felt racing in a while. But I just tried to come in, loosen up, warm up and get ready. I was a little more awake in the afternoon than I was this morning. I was able to get up and put a good effort in, get out there and race those guys.”

Berens figured it would be easier to hold off Phelps than it would be to catch him.

“Coming into this meet, I really wanted to try to do what I’m going to do at trials,” Berens said. “I knew I needed to get out faster and try to hit that first 100 a little better. I like being ahead.”

But he, too, knew not to put too much stock in winning a Grand Prix meet in May. That was apparent when Lochte stepped up to the blocks in a skimpy blue suit, like a swimmer out of the 1980s.

“At this point in the season, everybody is at a different part of their season,” Berens said. “Someone is a little more tired than the next person. Ryan Lochte is over there racing in just his brief, doing whatever he does. Everybody is in a different place. I’m just excited to be where I am.”

Some bellies hang over the swim suits and a woman keeps mumbling about getting water in her ear. These aren’t pros or even talented youngsters.

They are in their 20s and 30s and are so different from the solitary man in the fifth lane who has arrived carrying a black mesh bag that holds goggles, a pair of fins, a small parachute and a snorkel that looks like one your 10-year-old might take to the beach.

Jason Lezak looks back at the clock after he competes during the heats in the 100m freestyle at U.S. Nationals in August, 2010 (Alex Gallardo/Reuters)

Jason Lezak is 36 years old and already has four Olympic gold medals to his credit, including two won at the Beijing Games in 2008.

He is still freckled-faced and is the father of two, and he is a solitary trainer at this point in his life.

He sees no need to have a coach barking orders or split times or to give him a complicated year-long written plan.

After an hour’s workout on a weekday at the pool that is within five minutes of his Irvine home, Lezak said what he did, including using the fins and the snorkel, was part of a training plan that comes into his head as he stands on the deck on any particular morning.

“It’s what I need then,” Lezak said. “I have it all in my head now from all those years. Why should anyone else know better than me what I need? And why should I need anyone else to motivate me? At this point, if I can’t do it, I shouldn’t bother.”

Besides his Olympic hauls, Lezak also has four world championship gold medals as well as a silver and a bronze.

He was 32 and the oldest man on the U.S. swimming team in Beijing and will be 36 and most certainly the oldest man on the U.S. team in London should Lezak qualify for his fourth Olympics.

So, of course, there is the question.

Why?

The answer doesn’t come in words.

It comes from watching a decorated Olympian practice in anonymity. He takes a gulp from a white squeeze water bottle, does a couple of stretches and dives in. He does some slow freestyle laps, about 10, then the same number of butterfly laps, then he switches back to freestyle.

He wears goggles and he reaches into his bag for a small paddleboard and the flippers. He puts on the flippers and swims only on his right side, kicking then turning and keeping a leisurely pace. These seemingly insignificant movements help him with strength and balance, Lezak said.

After about 25 minutes, Lezak takes his snorkel. He’s still wearing the goggles and the fins. No stranger would walk up and say, “Hey, there’s an Olympic gold-medal swimmer.”

The snorkel, Lezak said, ensures a steady pace of breathing. The flippers keep him on the straight and narrow. “I’m old,” he said. “I can’t do all that pounding, all that mileage. I have figured out how to do the most in a short amount of time.”

He also packs a little parachute that he will attach to his legs to cause drag in the water. It is a way to do strength training, Lezak said.

Despite all his racing hardware, Lezak is most remembered for an Olympic moment that benefited the world’s most famous swimmer, Michael Phelps.

When Phelps was aiming for a record eight gold medals in Beijing, Lezak became a mini-star. It was Lezak who chased down France’s Alain Bernard in the final 20 meters of the 4×100 freestyle relay to help give the U.S., and Phelps, a gold.

That’s the kind of swimming Lezak churns up when he attaches that parachute to his feet and begins kicking. All of a sudden it’s as if a shark has emerged from the bottom of the pool causing a commotion with splashing and noise. There is method to this as well. “Sudden bursts,” Lezak said. “That’s what a sprinter does.”

Lezak has swum at this pool most of his life. It’s where he grew up. His life now is simple. “Weights in the morning,” he said. “Then the power from the gym, I apply to the pool. I do some resistance swimming, some speed work after that, take that power into real speed.

“As the body gets older, sometimes the mind wants to go hard for a lot longer. But I’ve learned over the course of the last several years how many laps is enough, how many is too much.”

Lezak, of course, has been coached. He worked with Dave Salo, who coaches a bunch of Olympic hopefuls at USC. But that kind of mass practice isn’t for Lezak anymore.

He is married to Danielle, who is a nurse and an ex-swimmer. He has a 2{-year-old son, Ryan, and Blake, a 6-month-old son. Both have arrived since the Beijing Games and maybe there were days or weeks when Lezak contemplated retirement but not seriously.

Still, Lezak admits he’s getting nervous as trials approach. “More than ever,” he says. “When I first started going to trials, I knew everything. And that was a bad thing because I’d be in the ready room, looking across and most of the names were of people with American records, national champions, gold medalists, and my self-confidence was great yet I didn’t know if I could beat any of them.

“Now I have the confidence. I’ve put in the work. I’ve beaten people I wasn’t supposed to beat. I started being able to go to races like I could win.”

Lezak says he will occasionally pop in a DVR of that Beijing relay where he helped Phelps.

“It doesn’t seem like it’s me, even after it happened and we won the gold medal,” he said. “I don’t think I realized the impact it made, how people perceived it back home. I started being invited on talk shows. People stopped me at airports. I had been an Olympian two times before but now I got noticed. That’s not my type of personality and I’ve had to adapt.”

Lezak has no desire to be a star. He doesn’t want to be Michael Phelps. He said his favorite race in Beijing wasn’t the relay he helped the U.S. win for Phelps but his individual bronze medal. “I had to dig deep for that. I was 32 years old and my body didn’t recover after the relay. I had to dig deep for that bronze.”

He is also at peace with however the U.S. Olympic trials go. “I’m confident,” he said. “I know I’ve done everything I was possibly meant to do to be the best,” he said. “I want very much to go to my fourth Olympic Games, but if it doesn’t work out, I’ve had a great career.”

___

(c)2012 the Los Angeles Times

Visit the Los Angeles Times at www.latimes.com

Distributed by MCT Information Services

In the interview, Phelps confirms the rumors that he will retire after this year’s Olympics, no matter the outcome, with a gleeful eye towards his post-swimming life, free of rigid, unyielding routine.

“Once I retire, I’m retiring,” he told Cooper. “I’m done.”

As such, London would be Phelps’s last chance at breaking Larisa Latynina’s Olympic medal record of 18 and extending his gold medal record even further. Phelps currently has 16 total Olympic medals, 14 of them gold.

Michael Phelps: After Beijing, I mean, there’s countless times where I’ve just wanted to be like, “I don’t want to do this anymore. I don’t want to go to the pool every day.”

Anderson Cooper: So now is it, is it hard getting out of bed in the morning?

Michael Phelps: No, because one, we’re so close. And two, because I’m actually enjoying it. I’m swimming well again.

A somewhat surprising revelation during the interview, the decision for Phelps to come keep training for the 2012 Olympics wasn’t set in stone. In 2009, Phelps lacked motivation and the drive required of elite level swimmers that spend hours in the pool and weight room preparing.

“I thought it was a 50-50,” Phelps’s coach, Bob Bowman said. “I really didn’t have a feel for whether he would come back or not come back.”

But now, Phelps seems focused and determined, sleeping in an altitude sleeping chamber to simulate sleep at over 8,000 feet and a renewed focus on strength training.

Whereas Phelps appeared confident about his chances in London, Bowman was cautiously tight-lipped about his superstar’s prospects this July, saying that he can win multiple gold medals, but that is up to him.

Deaf swimmer Marcus Titus, who posted the fastest time by an American in the 100-meter breaststroke in 2012, relies on hand motions to signal the starting procedures at races. (Michael Conroy/Associated Press)

USA Swimming decided Thursday to allow hand signals at the U.S. Olympic trials in July to accommodate deaf swimmers at the start of their races, reversing the organization’s decision, issued less than 48 hours earlier, to not use the signals because they did not comply with international rules.

The governing body announced its decision shortly after Marcus Titus, one of the nation’s top breaststrokers and a deaf athlete, created a Facebook page asking supporters to e-mail USA Swimming officials. He was joined by officials at U.S. Deaf Swimming and the USA Deaf Sports Federation, who wanted to ensure hearing impaired athletes are given a level playing field on which to compete against hearing athletes.

After months of communications, Titus found out Tuesday morning that he would not receive the hand signals laid out in the USA Swimming rulerbook (Article 105.3) that gives instructions for officials to use hand signals for deaf and hearing impaired swimmers, signaling the starting procedures.

Because FINA, the sport’s international governing body, does not have protocols for hearing impaired swimmers, USA Swimming decided to negate its existing rules for deaf swimmers.

Frank Busch, USA Swimming’s national team director, said the organization responded quickly to correct a poor initial decision that came about because swimming officials sought to replicate precisely the conditions its swimmers would face at the London Games.

“What we thought was the right thing to do here was the wrong thing,” Busch said. “It was an oversight. As soon as he said something, we got it corrected.”

In the water, Titus is just another swimmer. But before a race, he has to worry about procedures that hearing swimmers never think twice about: hearing the referee’s instructions to step onto the starting blocks, or when to take his mark in preparation of the start. Most important, he does not hear the buzzer signaling the start of the race.

Instead, he has relied on visual signals, a raised arm by the referee to indicate “ready” and “set,” and a light strobe behind his starting block to signal “go,” at national and international meets this year. Without hand signals, Titus is forced to watch his competitors in order to know when to step on to the starting blocks and when to take his mark.

“This is very frustrating. I have to deal with the additional stress of wondering whether I’ll get a fair start,” Titus said in an e-mail. “This not only makes me the last one on the blocks, it also makes me the last one to get set. I then have a shorter amount of ‘set’ time and sometimes am not entirely prepared for my dive.”

In a sport often decided by fractions of a second, any delay in reaction time off the start can cost a swimmer the race. At the 2008 U.S. Olympic trials, the difference between second and third in the 100 breaststroke, was 0.17 of a second. That is the difference between making the U.S. Olympic team and watching from home.

Last month in Indianapolis, Titus posted the fastest time by an American in the 100-meter breaststroke in 2012 — beating four-time Olympic medalist Brendan Hansen at the USA Swimming-sponsored grand prix event by 0.18 of a second.

Busch, who coached Titus at the University of Arizona, said USA Swimming has sent the same hand-signal professional on the road with Titus to meets for years.

Busch said USA Swimming would urge FINA to make an exception for Titus at the Olympic Games should Titus make the team.

“If Marcus makes the team, [USA Swimming] would probably champion [the] cause for London,” Busch said.

Titus is not swimming’s first elite deaf athlete. At the 2000 Sydney Olympics, Terence Parkin of South Africa won the silver medal in the 200 breaststroke. In footage of Parkin’s races at the Sydney games, it appears the FINA referee holds his hand out, giving the visual signal for “set.”

For Titus, this was a small win in a larger fight for equality for deaf swimmers who are still at a disadvantage, having to rely on referees remembering to use the hand signals. If he makes the U.S. squad, he will have to make similar pleas to FINA prior to the Olympics.

Michael Phelps showcased some of his old speed at the Indianapolis Grand Prix, winning the 200-meter individual medley final in 1 minute 56.32 seconds. (Dilip Vishwanat/GETTY IMAGES)

INDIANAPOLIS — As Michael Phelps stood poolside doing a television interview moments after claiming the gold medal in the 200-meter individual medley final at the Indianapolis Grand Prix on Saturday night, Ryan Lochte emerged slowly and grimly from the water, his chest heaving and cheeks red.

Phelps, the reigning Olympic champion in the event, dominated to earn a victory in 1 minute 56.32 seconds, claiming his third gold medal and fourth overall of this three-day meet. Lochte, who broke Phelps’s world record in the event last summer, settled for his second bronze of the night — and only his second medal in six events at this meet. He finished in 1:59.37.

As Phelps thrived at this tune-up meet for the July U.S. Olympic trials, showcasing some of his old speed even without taking a break from hard training, Lochte, the most dominant swimmer in the world last year, seemed largely quiet and out of sight.

He didn’t even qualify for the A finals in the 100 freestyle and 100 butterfly Thursday. He did not get within stepping distance of the top of a medal stand. He swam out of Lane 1 in the 200 medley final.

Yet he showed not a hint of concern after Saturday’s races. As is customary for Lochte at this time of year, he is in the midst of brutally hard training. He has refused to wear the jammer suits that offer at least a slight speed edge; instead, he wore colorful briefs for all of his races here. And he took on a challenging double Saturday night: Just 30 minutes before the individual medley final, he placed third in the 100 backstroke final.

“I’m seeing spots right now,” Lochte said shortly after the second race.

Phelps, though happy with his times and medal haul here, said he wouldn’t think of reading anything into Lochte’s invisibility.

“He’s there when it counts,” Phelps said. “I know that. . . . As long as you’re there at the right time, that’s all that matters. He always is.”

Phelps couldn’t get excited about beating Lochte, but he drew encouragement from his own performances. He finished second to Nathan Adrian in the 100 free, won the 100 fly, then won the 400 individual medley in his fastest in-season time ever. Saturday offered another reason for optimism: He said his time in the 200 medley was a half-second faster than last year at this time.

“I’m probably like, on a scale of one to 10, maybe like a 7¹/₂ to 8,” he said. “I’m heading in the right direction.”

Lochte’s training team in Gainesville, Fla., under Coach Gregg Troy just completed its hardest segment of training of the season, with six lighter weeks ahead. The routine has been the same for Lochte since the 2008 Summer Games, and though it looks ugly at meet like this, it’s worked pretty well.

Last year, Lochte beat Phelps twice in head-to-head races at the August world championships in Shanghai and broke Phelps’s world record in the 200 medley. The year before, he dominated at the Pan Pacific Championships in Irvine, Calif., as Phelps struggled.

In the men’s 100 backstroke Saturday, Lochte tied for third in 54.75 as Nick Thoman won the gold in 53.95.

“The times are irrelevant to me,” Lochte said. “I just know all of that hard work that I’ve been doing . . . is going to pay off.”

It’s difficult to draw conclusions about anyone from the times or performances at mid-season meets such as this. Great Falls’s Kate Ziegler and Towson’s Katie Hoff, who won five gold medals between them at the 2007 world championships, used this grand prix as their first test under their new, old coaches. Both returned to the coaches of their youth this year, leaving the Fullerton, Calif., post-graduate training center each joined after the 2008 Summer Games.

Ziegler returned to Virginia in late March to train under Ray Benecki of the FISH; Hoff moved to Naples, Fla., in January to rejoin Paul Yetter, her former coach at the North Baltimore Aquatic Club who now leads a training group on Florida’s west coast.

“I felt like I needed to be in a place I felt 100 percent confident,” Hoff said. “Paul’s training always suited me as far as giving me that confidence.”

Hoff finished second in the 400 free, fourth in the 200 free, 10th in the 100 free, sixth in Saturday’s 200 individual medley final (2:14.99) and 13th in the 200 fly (2:18.07). Ziegler was sixth in the 400 free, 22nd in the 200 free and second in Saturday’s 800 final (8:33.86). Both say they are adjusting to their new training regimens.

“I felt my training wasn’t where I wanted it to be,” Ziegler said. “Ray and I left on great terms and we stayed on great terms. . . . And the best thing is just being back with my family.”

Michael Phelps looks up at the scoreboard after the men's 400-meter individual medley final at the Indianapolis Grand Prix. Phelps held off Tyler Clary to win the event in 4 minutes 12.51 seconds. (Darron Cummings/Associated Press)

INDIANAPOLIS — Michael Phelps hates the 400-meter individual medley. He hates the pain it produces. He hates the training time it requires. He hates the mental toll it exacts. Since he won a gold medal in the event at the 2008 Summer Games in Beijing, he has sworn he will never swim it again in another Olympics.

Yet he sounded very much Friday night as if he were leaning toward adding it to his program at the U.S. Olympic trials in July, a decision that would set up a huge, highly anticipated confrontation on Day 1 with rival Ryan Lochte, the current 400 IM world champion.

“It’s a race that means a lot to us as a country and for me, somebody who has swum it so many times,” Phelps said. “If it happens, it would start everything off on an exciting note.”

About an hour earlier, Phelps won the 400 individual medley final at the Indianapolis Grand Prix in 4 minutes 12.51 seconds, topping Tyler Clary, who came home in 4:13.01. Though Phelps’s time was about nine seconds off of his world record, it was actually — and somewhat amazingly — the fastest Phelps had ever swum in-season, he and his coach said, including leading up to the 2008 Summer Games.

“I’m definitely happy,” Phelps said. “Who knows [about the Olympics]? . . . I would have to do that well and then be able to come back and swim a bunch of other events well.”

Added Phelps with a grin, reminded that he said he would never swim the 400 medley again: “Yes, it is different than what I said before. I understand that.”

Phelps’s coach, Bob Bowman, admitted in 2009 that it was his “dream” for Phelps to take up the 400 medley after dispensing with it after the Beijing Games. NBC executives may very well have the same dream, and they could be hyperventilating over the possibility of a Phelps-Lochte showdown to open the swimming competition at the 2012 Summer Games in London.

“I know he hasn’t done it in the three years since ’08, but it’s coming up to an Olympic year and he’s done the training,” Lochte said. “He knows he’s capable of doing it. I told myself, ‘He’s going to do it again.’ There’s no doubt in my mind. I honestly think he’d be dumb if he didn’t.”

In other news Friday, teen star Missy Franklin claimed a pair of medals, winning gold in the 200 backstroke in 2:07.97 and silver in the 200 freestyle (1:57.97) behind Allison Schmitt (1:56.79); Towson’s Katie Hoff placed fourth in 1:58.64. Lochte, who is in the midst of heavy training, finished fourth in the 200 backstroke in 1:59.34 and did not compete in the 200 freestyle.

Dara Torres, 44, finished sixth in the 50 freestyle final in 25.47, a respectable time after the 25.36 she posted to take second in the morning heats. Madison Kennedy won the gold in 24.99. In the men’s 50, Nathan Adrian claimed the gold in 21.88 as Anthony Ervin took the bronze in 22.24. Ervin, 30, returned to swimming last year after an eight-year absence; he won gold in the 50 free at the 2000 Summer Games in Sydney.

In the 400 individual medley, Phelps was pushed hard by Clary, who took the lead on the backstroke leg but surrendered it during the breaststroke. Phelps came home fast, determined to hold off Clary.

“It is interesting,” Bowman said about Phelps’s surprising time. “He just killed himself to do that. He had to gut it out. . . . But our goal was to break [4:]15. He’s in pretty good shape to do that time — obviously.”

Though Bowman pointed out that the 400 individual medley presents a grueling way to kick off an Olympics, the only thing really standing in the way of Phelps’s swimming the event at the U.S. Olympic trials is Phelps. Even Phelps’s mother Debbie has tried to persuade her son to return to one of his signature races. It interferes with nothing else on the Olympic schedule.

“He said he’s never swimming it again,” Bowman said before the race. “I never said he’s not doing it again.”

Phelps has wrestled with the 400 medley since Beijing. He swam the event in yards in 2009 in an unsuccessful attempt to regain his old world record at that distance. He took it up for the 2010 Pan Pacific Championships in Irvine, but performed so abysmally he didn’t advance out of the morning finals.

After that, he announced that he was done. The 400 individual medley was finished.

But not really. He unveiled it at the Austin Grand Prix two months ago, putting up a time of 4:16.95 to win the event.

“There’s a crack in the door,” Bowman said. “Maybe a bigger crack than the other night.”

At the ripe old age of 44, Dara Torres, shown here during the 2008 Olympics, posted the second-fastest qualifying time in the 50-meter freestyle heats. (Itsuo Inouye/AP)

Minutes later, two other swimmers made a similar request; once Torres finished with them, one more walked up with a grin and camera. Though men’s megastars Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte are here, no other swimmer got accosted Friday morning quite as thoroughly as Torres, who at 44 — soon to be 45 — is trying to make her sixth Olympic team.

In the 50-meter freestyle heats minutes earlier, Torres looked like more than just a fabled swimmer from the past. She posted the second-fastest qualifying time — 25.36 seconds — despite misjudging the start and getting out more slowly than any of the final 16 competitors.

“It felt easy,” Torres said while the two professional stretchers she employs massaged her body with their bare feet shortly after the swim. ”For me, it’s about what happens when I come back” in tonight’s final. ”It’s really about trying to nail down the recovery. The other issue is I ’ll be swimming about the time I normally go to bed.”

Only Christine Magnuson (25.16) posted a faster qualifying time. Amanda Weir (25.64) and Jessica Hardy (25.65) also secured places in the final.

In other news, Towson’s Katie Hoff put up the fastest time in the 200 freestyle heats (1:59.00) hours after having finished second in the 400 freestyle final Thursday night. Teen star Missy Franklin placed second in 2:11.28. Great Falls’ Kate Ziegler qualified for the C Final with her time of 2:04.77, the 23rd best of the morning.

Michael Phelps put up the second-best qualifying time in an event he hates and claims to be swimming only for “training.” He finished in 4 minutes, 21.31 seconds in the heats of the 400 individual medley, behind only Tyler Clary (4:19.02). Ryan Lochte, the reigning world champion in the event, skipped it at this meet because it conflicted with two other specialties in which he swam Friday morning; he qualified for the finals of the 200 free (1:50.17) and the 200 back (2:00.33).

Anthony Ervin, an Olympic gold medal winner who retired in 2003 and returned to training last year, put up the second-best qualifying time in the 50 free (22.56).

Michael Phelps competes in the 100-meter butterfly at the Indianapolis Grand Prix swimming meet. (Michael Conroy/AP)

INDIANAPOLIS —A couple decades ago, college-age kids and teens populated swimming. The advent of professionalism and sponsor dollars led to a new era dominated by full-grown, post-graduate men and women.

This season has brought another trend. It’s suddenly very hip to be 30-something – or older — and back in the pool seeking a spot at the 2012 Summer Games in London after several years, or even a decade, of retirement.

The Indianapolis Grand Prix showcased a handful of former retirees preparing for another Olympic run Thursday. There was four-time Olympic medalist Brendan Hansen, 30, who ended a 2¹/_2-year retirement with the hope of making his third Olympic team. He finished fourth in the men’s 200-meter breaststroke final Thursday night with a time of 2 minutes 13.93 seconds.

“It’s definitely been a test of patience,” Hansen said. “I told myself I was never going to compare myself to where I used to be. . . . But everybody else does that.”

Swimming in the lane next to him was the top American in the sport before Hansen took over: Lake Braddock High’s Ed Moses, 31, who returned to competition last year after more than six years out of the sport. A two-time medalist at the 2000 Summer Games, Moses faces a considerable challenge to make this year’s Olympic team, but he qualified for the night’s A final and finished seventh overall in 2:16.08.

“It’s going to be tight on time,” said Moses, who attended the University of Virginia. “I knew that when I started. It’s going to be hard. . . . That doesn’t deter me, though, from believing I can do it.”

Another ex-retiree, Anthony Ervin, 30, placed 16th overall in the 100 freestyle (50.85). Ervin, who won a gold in the 50 free at the 2000 Summer Games, took about eight years off before pursuing a comeback last year; he has posted surprisingly fast times in his specialty, which will be contested Friday. Ervin enters with the ninth-fastest qualifying time (22.27)

Ervin, Hansen and Moses represent just a few of the former superstars who ditched their goggles for a few years, but couldn’t stay away. Janet Evans, the one-time teen phenom who retired at the 1996 Summer Games in Atlanta, will compete at the Olympic trials in Omaha in June, a long shot to make her fourth Olympic team at 40 after 15 years out of the sport.

One of the greatest swimmers in history, Australian Ian Thorpe, came out of retirement last year, but his bid to make Australia’s Olympic team failed less than two weeks ago at his nation’s Olympic trials. Libby Trickett, Michael Klim and Geoff Huegill also un-retired to compete.

“When I was growing up, swimming seemed like something you did through college . . . then the rigors of adult life kind of consumed you,” said Ervin, who was in graduate school last year at the University of California when he decided to resume training with the college team a year ago. “At the turn of the millennium, there were notable differences in how it’s been professionalized.”

Results here mean little as few of the swimmers are in top form and many, including 2011’s most dominant male swimmer, Ryan Lochte, are smack in the middle of heavy training. Lochte finished ninth in the 100 freestyle in 49.46 seconds as Nathan Adrian (48.62) topped Michael Phelps (48.74) for the gold medal — despite the fact that Adrian’s jammer shorts split in the back seconds before the race.

Later, in the 100 butterfly, Phelps claimed the gold medal in 52.23 and Lochte got ninth in 52.32. In the women’s 400 free, Towson’s Katie Hoff claimed second in 4:07.00 and Kate Ziegler of Great Falls placed sixth in 4:12.98.

One reason Hansen said he didn’t want to compare himself to his old self was that he didn’t want to finish the same way he did in 2008. After winning individual silver and bronze medals at the 2004 Summer Games in the 100 and 200 breast, he finished fourth in the 100 breast in Beijing, his only individual event.

Demoralized and burned out, Hansen got out of the sport fast. He dived into triathlons and helped manage a nutritional supplement company. He had no intention of returning, but missed the competition.

“A lot of the expectations and pressure I had in ’08 was from myself,” Hansen said. “How you react to yourself is really important in how successful you are. Now, I’m going out there with a clear head, a refreshed outlook.”

Moses tried professional golf and a marketing job in Los Angeles. But he never found the same level of success he hit in the swimming pool just a couple years out of high school.

“He’s a competitor,” Hansen said. “He’ll be there racing, no matter what. It’s just that he may run out of time.”

So might they all.