It's our only chance to connect with the swimmers before they head for China. USA Swimming is polite but firm about that. We have schedules for when we can shoot practice (today only, 7-9 a.m., thank you) and where we can shoot (behind this line please, only at the far end of the pool) and who we can talk to (please don't bother the coaches) and when we should head inside for scheduled interview opportunities.



It's a mess but actually a really fun mess. We finally manage to interview Margaret Hoelzer and Megan Jendrick, poolside. They're still wet, hair all plastered to their heads, very relaxed and chatty. It's a good setting, much nicer that the horribly sterile space that has been arranged for interviews. At least the pool looks like a pool and has red, white and blue flags scattered about. The interview room is sterile, pastel, walled in by plastic panels. There is not a visual hint of anything suggesting swimming or the Olympics or the USA, except for the flag being used by the photographer in the corner as a prop for team portraits. The scene is wooden tables and folding chairs and no real organization and bad acoustics and dueling photographers and dueling microphones and dueling light kits and dueling reporters with different deadlines and different agendas. Like I say, a pretty fun mess.

And the disorganization helps. We're able to get a few minutes alone with Nathan Adrian of Bremerton, a really nice young man who made the team as a freestyle relay swimmer. He's delighted to be here, genuinely pleased with himself and very proud of the list of top-flight swimmers to come out of Kitsap County.

I take snapshots of Nathan draped in the portrait-photograph's flag, Megan showing off her post-workout muffin, Phelps and Natalie Coughlin floating in a sea of media. I listen in to WonderWoman Dara Torres talk about being 41 and making her 5th Olympic team. It's a good day on the job.