Swimmers experience back-and-forth day at U.S. national championships

Jimmy Feigen was in …and then he wasn’t.

Josh Schneider was out and kept appealing decision after decision and finally got on the blocks for the 50-meter freestyle at the U.S. national championships in Irvine on Thursday night.

The bizarre back-and-forth day was triggered when Schneider forgot to scratch from the morning preliminaries in the 100 butterfly. He said later that he and his coaches didn’t even know he was entered and was stunned there was even an issue.

Under the rules, not scratching put him out of the 50 freestyle and led to his subsequent appeals, three in all. Under protest, he got in and Feigen was pushed to the consolation final. Then, on top of it all, Schneider ended up tying with Cullen Jones for second place, in 21.97 seconds. The winner was Nathan Adrian in 21.70.

Results were unofficial and won’t be finalized until Friday. So just call it the Phantom Final.

“I was oblivious I was entered in the 100 fly,” Schneider said, calling it an honest mistake. He added that he would have jumped into the pool with his clothes on and false started had he known about the issue even seconds before the race in the morning.

Schneider has one appeal remaining, which was to be determined Friday. Feigen just wished it had been handled better.

“It was just back and forth, and I wouldn’t have minded either way,” he said. “It would have just been nice if they had just made up their mind as soon as it happened.”

Nearly everything else went to form: Rebecca Soni had the fastest time in the world this year in the 100 breaststroke, winning by more than two seconds, in 1:05.73. Kara Lynn Joyce won the 50 freestyle, redemption of sorts after she finished ninth in that event at nationals last year. And Caitlin Leverenz took the 400 individual medley, beating Ariana Kukors and Katie Hoff.

Meanwhile, all was right with Michael Phelps.

Phelps, who had been upset about his performance in winning the 200 butterfly Wednesday night, felt pleased about his reversal in form in winning the 100 butterfly. He won convincingly, in 50.65, and Tyler McGill was second in 52.20.

“My stroke felt a whole lot better tonight than it did last night,” said Phelps, who won his 50th national title. “I felt like I hit my walls good, felt like I broke good. Tonight was a lot different feeling than what I had last night.”

His coach Bob Bowman was asked about Phelps’ harsh self-assessment the previous day and said he welcomed it.

“I love it. He should be. Number one, it’s brutally honest, which he needs to be,” Bowman said. “And number two, it just gives him good motivation…That was really well done the whole way around.”

Perhaps the most convincing victory was by Soni against a field featuring the likes of Jessica Hardy, Megan Jendrick and Amanda Beard. Beard, in her first major meet since having a child, received a warm ovation. She finished sixth, and Hardy was seventh.

It was a tough night for Hardy who was later sixth in the 50 freestyle. Hardy returned in 2009 having served a one-year suspension after testing positive for clenbuterol at the Olympic trials in 2008.

“I over-thought it,” she said of her races here. “What happened tonight was a little bit my head and not my physical capacity. So I’m very disappointed. I definitely had some rough stuff this past year I’m battling. That was a result of that.”

lisa.dillman@latimes.com

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