Ryan Murphy came to the Paris Olympics aiming to win back his backstroke titles. Instead, he will have to be content with just one bronze medal.
The 29-year-old from Florida was unexpectedly eliminated in the semifinals of the 200-meter backstroke on Wednesday night. His time of 1 minute 56.62 seconds was only the 10th fastest out of 16 swimmers, just a tenth of a second short of making it into the top eight needed to advance to the final on Thursday.
“I really don’t have a great frame on it,” Murphy said, trying to understand what went wrong. “Obviously, I’m very disappointed. It’s my fault. I just didn’t gauge it well enough.”
Murphy had won all the backstroke events at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games, continuing the strong American tradition in those races. In Tokyo, he earned silver and bronze, which motivated him to aim for gold in Paris.
However, he could only manage a bronze in the 100 backstroke, and he won’t compete for a medal in the 200.