Ryan Lochte had an abrupt ending to the Arena Grand Prix in Mesa, Ariz. The 11-time Olympic medalist pulled out of his two finals Saturday after warm-ups for reported health reasons.
Lochte was slated to swim the 100m backstroke and 200m individual medley finals on the third and final day of competition. He won the 100m butterfly, over Michael Phelps, on Thursday and the 200m freestyle Friday. He scratched out of the 200m back final Friday.
Lochte tore his left MCL and sprained his ACL after a teenage girl ran to him, he caught her and they both fell on Nov. 2. His knee hit a curb, Lochte’s publicist said. He was back racing in February, but he said he pushed the knee too hard in swimming at an Orlando meet, aggravating the injury. He did race in March, though.
Media in Mesa reported Lochte’s injury to be a knee, leg or hamstring.
Lochte’s coach in Charlotte is David Marsh.
Three-time 2008 Olympic medalist Katie Hoff led the winners Saturday, dominating the 200m individual medley by 1.69 seconds in 2:12.92.
Hoff, 24, took more than a year off after missing the 2012 Olympic Team but was reinvigorated for the sport while attending the World Junior Championships in Dubai in August.
“I think I just needed to step away for a little bit,” Hoff, who got engaged after throwing a ceremonial first pitch at a Tampa Bay Rays game Sunday, said on Universal Sports. “I watched all those fast kids enjoy it and swim fast. I thought, I’m not done. I want to be down there racing, too.”
Hoff dusted a field that included both of the U.S. 200m IM representatives at the 2013 World Championships, Caitlin Leverenz and Elizabeth Beisel. World Swimmer of the Year Katie Ledecky qualified fourth into the final, behind Hoff, Leverenz and Beisel, but scratched out of it.
Ledecky later won the 800m freestyle in 8:20.10. The Olympic and world champion Ledecky, 17, beat the second-place finisher, Danish world silver medalist Lotte Friis, by nearly 13 seconds. Ledecky swept the 200m, 400m and 800m freestyles in Mesa.
In another dominating effort, world silver medalist Michael McBroom won the 1500m by nearly 31 seconds in 15:08.86. Three-time South African Olympian Darian Townsend took the men’s 200m IM by 1.73 seconds in 2:02.07.
Olympic 200m backstroke champion Tyler Clary won the 200m butterfly in 2:00.39, edging 2013 World Championships teammate Tom Luchsinger by .01. Rising star Becca Mann, 16, won the women’s 200m butterfly by 1.85 seconds in 2:12.10.
Olympic champion Matt Grevers was beaten in the 100m backstroke by Arkady Vyatchanin, 54.40 to 54.50. Two-time Mexican Olympian Fernanda Gonzalez captured the women’s 100m back by .67 in 1:01.58.
Three-time Jamaican Olympian Alia Atkinson completed a sweep of the breaststrokes, taking the 100m breast in 1:07.50, a whopping 1.43 seconds ahead of second-place Micah Lawrence. Slovenia’s Damir Dugonjic took the men’s 100m breast over U.S. champion Kevin Cordes by .06.
The next USA Swimming Grand Prix meet is in Charlotte, N.C., from May 15-18. Phelps is expected to compete there.
