The opening ceremony kicks off tonight and it should be pretty exciting to watch, as always. It turns out, the loud “Ibiza” music played at night was a rehearsal for the ceremony, and I expect there will be some helicopters included in the show, since they’ve been flying back and forth all day the last couple days.

As with the last two Olympic games, I wont be participating in this ceremony since it usually requires about 5-6 hours of standing/sitting around, and that’s some serious stress to a swimmer’s body the night before the beginning of competition. The worst part of it is, we athletes don’t get to see the magic of the show if we participate in it. For my best interest, its better to watch it on TV like most of you out there.
I compete in my first race on day 2 of the Olympic Games, which is on Sunday, the 29th of July. I’m leading off the 4×100 freestyle relay, probably in Heat #1. Although making the finals probably isn’t realistic, its an opportunity for me to get a good race in before the 100 butterfly on Tuesday, the 2nd of august. In any case, it’s a lot of fun and a real honor to represent your country in a relay!