Watered Down

The math wasn’t working out.

Not in the minds of University of California women’s swim Coach Teri McKeever and the multi-tasking, multi-talented swim star Natalie Coughlin.

They could fiddle with entering this event, skipping that event, but, inevitably, the Olympic schedule was an object with no give.

So many swims, so little time.

Instead of super-sizing, trying to be ultra-ambitious, the duo went in the opposite direction.

They downsized.

With the U.S. Olympic swimming trials beginning Wednesday in Long Beach, Coughlin, 21, has greatly reduced the items on her menu. She intends to swim in only two individual events, the 100-meter freestyle and the 100 backstroke, in which she holds the world record of 59.58 seconds. Friday is the final of the 100 backstroke; the final for the 100 freestyle is Monday.

Coughlin also remains on the entry list for the 200 backstroke, but she indicated last month at the Janet Evans Invitational that she probably would not participate in that race. Her goal is to be fresh for the three relay events in the Olympics at Athens.

Two related issues complicated the decision. Not only are there preliminaries for the multiple individual events she was considering, there is an extra layer of semifinals on the program.

McKeever listed the times between events at the Olympics one morning on the pool deck last month in Long Beach: “The 100 fly and semis of the 100 back is 12 minutes apart; that’s not doable. The 200 free and the 100 back is like 22 minutes, so that’s not doable. The 100 free and 200 back is 27 minutes and most likely not doable.”

Coughlin is putting her potential Olympic teammates ahead of herself. The team concept was important at Cal, and it remains a major part of her makeup.

“We factored in when the relays are going to be,” McKeever said. “She wants to be on the relays. [She] could have said, ‘I don’t want to be on the relay. The individual thing is more important.’ That’s not what she’s about.”

The decision perhaps was made for them about a year ago in the world championships at Barcelona, Spain. All the talk was about a possible six or seven gold medals for Coughlin and Michael Phelps.

But Coughlin became ill with a virus, suffering through a 103-degree fever, and managed a gold medal in the 400 freestyle relay and silver in the 400 medley relay. She failed to get out of the preliminaries in the 100 backstroke.

Phelps won six medals, four of them gold, set five world records and became the early face of the 2004 Games. Coughlin seems relieved to be free of that overwhelming responsibility.

“Michael benefits from all that pressure and attention,” she said. “We’re two completely different people. We react differently to different situations. I think he’s doing great at that.”

Coughlin’s virus took a toll well beyond Barcelona. McKeever said during the Evans meet that the illness lingered and Coughlin’s training was affected throughout the fall.

“Life is going to deal you [stuff] like that,” McKeever said of Coughlin, who also survived a potentially career-ending shoulder injury as a teenager. “It’s the way you choose to look at it. That could have been a huge devastation, ‘My Olympics are over.’

“Or it could be like, ‘OK, that’s where I was.’ I think it did factor into some of the decisions.”

Phelps’ pursuit of Mark Spitz’s record of seven gold medals at one Olympics has created the dual dose of high expectations and increased scrutiny. Coughlin looked slightly taken aback when it was mentioned that Phelps has two reporters from major daily newspapers assigned to cover him on a regular basis.

“I’m a very private person. I think I’d go crazy,” she said.

“I’ve lived by myself for three years now, and I like it that way. Not that I’m anti-social. But I need my own space. If I had someone following me like that, I think I’d go crazy.”

But she has been able to enjoy the benefits of turning professional this year after completing her eligibility at Cal, in which she won 11 of a possible 12 NCAA titles in her career. Coughlin shot a commercial for NBC in Long Beach -- to be shown in movie theaters -- and enjoyed the process.

“Got to work on the terrible acting skills,” she said, laughing. “That was really, really fun. I had a stunt double and a driving double and all these different outfits. They had this poor little girl, who was my stunt double. They put her in a catapult and catapulted her five or six times into the ocean, which was really cold.

“There’s another one ... my driving double is driving a 2005 Corvette. I got to sit in it.

“I got to pretend it’s not me for the day.”

*

U.S. Olympic Swimming Trials

* When: Wednesday-July 14.

* Where: Long Beach aquatic complex.