2014 U.S. Winter Nationals: Day 2 Final Real-Time Recaps

Day 2 of the 2014 U.S. Winter Nationals are underway in Greensboro, North Carolina are underway, including an American Record watch for Katie Ledecky in the women’s 500 free.

2014 U.S. WINTER NATIONALS

• Full meet preview
• Greensboro, NC
• Dec. 3-6, 2014 (Wednesday through Saturday)
• Prelims 9am/Finals 5pm
• Prelims Timeline (Thursday)
• Psych sheets
• Live stream
• Live results

WOMEN’S 500y freestyle – Finals

• American Record: 4:28.71 02/07/2014 Katie Ledecky
• U.S. Open Record: 4:28.71 02/07/2014 Katie Ledecky
• NCAA “A” cut: 4:36.45

Katie Ledecky was just short of her own American and U.S. Open Records in the women’s 500 free on Thursday, but she did get the Meet Record with a 4:29.54 for the win – also the second-fastest 500 yard free in history. She crushed the field in this race, including runner-up Gillian Ryan, who re-broke her own Michigan School Record with a 4:37.78 for 2nd.

Ledecky swam her record at the DC Metro Champs earlier this year, and was out in similar speed (1:44.97 at Metro Champs, 1:45.00 in Greensboro), but wasn’t quite as fast closing as she was at the high school meet.

Ryan actually out-split Ledecky on the last 50 of this race, with a 26.14 over the last 50 yards. Her swim missed the NCAA “A” standard by just over a second, but should still qualify her easily.

Indiana’s Kennedy Goss, a Canadian, was 3rd in 4:38.35 and her teammate Haley Lips was 5th in 4:39.98. That should qualify them both for NCAA’s as well, based on history.

In between them was Danielle Valley of the Sarasota YMCA, who swam a 4:38.79. Valley spent a year at Florida before deciding to transfer. While she hasn’t announced where she’s going to wind up yet, this lifetime best swim will garner plenty of attention from interested coaches.

UCLA’s Katy Campbell was 7th in 4:40.53 and another Michigan freshman Hannah Moore was 8th in 4:40.90.

Event Results Here (PDF)

MEN’S 500y freestyle – FINALS

• American Record: 4:08.54 02/09/2008 Peter Vanderkaay
• U.S. Open Record: 4:08.54 02/09/2008 Peter Vanderkaay
• NCAA “A” cut: 4:14.59

Club Wolverine pro Connor Jaeger won his second-straight Winter National Championship in the 500 free with a 4:13.72 to open the men’s finals on Thursday at Winter Nationals. He never really separated from high school senior Townley Haas, though Haas held a slight lead on most of the first half of this race, and it was a great closing kick from Jaeger that gave him just a few inches of breathing room at the touch.

Haas took 2nd in 4:14.19, further raising the stock of a swimmer who was the best recruit in the country to not commit in the fall signing period (and #2 overall). That’s his lifetime best by over three seconds as compared to coming into the meet, and is the fourth-fastest time in age group history.

All time top 17-18’s:

1. Michael Phelps, 4:12.33, 2004
2. Reed Malone, 4:12.66, 2014
3. Jack Conger, 4:13.87, 2013
4. Townley Haas, 4:14.19, 2014
5. Mitch D’Arrigo, 4:15.04, 2013

Ryan Feeley took 3rd in 4:15.45, followed by True Sweetser of the Gator Swim Club in 4:17.65. Sweetseer is just 16-years old, and has been a stunning revelation at this meet.  The 17-year old high school junior was a 4:16 in prelims.

Louisville’s Trever Carroll took 5th in 4:18.73, and Georgia commit Aidan Burns was 6th in 4:19.04.

Canadian Jeremy Bagshaw won the B Final in 4:19.13.

Also of note, in the C Final NCAP 16-year old Matthew Hirschberger won the C-Final in 4:20.14, which was his own personal best by over three seconds and ranks him as the 12th-best 15-16 in USA Swimming history.

Event Results Here (PDF)

WOMEN’S 200y individual medley – FINALS

• American Record: 1:51.77 03/15/2012 Caitlin Leverenz
• U.S. Open Record: 1:51.77 03/15/2012 Caitlin Leverenz
• NCAA “A” cut: 1:55.35

SwimMAC Carolina’s Katie Meili continues to grow her professional resume with a win in the women’s 200 IM – easily taking a 1:54.20 on Thursday evening. That’s a new lifetime best for her, improving three-tenths of a second over the time she swam at NCAA’s as a senior in 2013.

Meili was impressively fast leading out on the fly leg of this race, and then pulled away from the field with a 32.0 breaststroke split. The only swimmer even close to her in this final was Danielle Hermann from the Clovis Swim Club, who split a 32.7 en route to finishing 7th in 1:59.26. That’s a good sign for her in the individual breaststrokes later in the meet.

Meili beat out Katie Ledecky, who on the second half of a back-to-back still went an admirable 1:56.04. That’s a lifetime best for her by a second-and-a-half as she continues to show that she brings a lot of value for Stanford beyond just the distance freestyles.

Meghan Small from the York YMCA took 3rd in 1:56.46; she was unsurprisingly passed by Ledecky on the freestyle leg for the silver medal.

Miranda Tucker took 4th in 1:57.87 and Michigan’s Clara Smiddy was 5th in 1:58.69.

Former Indiana All-American Bronwyn Pasloski, representing the Badger Swim Club, won the B-Final in 1:58.32. Michigan’s Marni Oldershaw and Lakeside Swim Team’s Brooke Forde tied for the win in the C-Final in 1:59.85. Oldershaw was more than two seconds faster at this same meet last season.

Event Results Here (PDF)

MEN’S  200y individual medley – FINALS

• American Record: 1:40.08 11/29/2007 Ryan Lochte
• U.S. Open Record: 1:40.08 11/29/2007 Ryan Lochte
• NCAA “A” cut: 1:42.76

The Club Wolverine men remained perfect through two events as Kyle Whitaker won the men’s 200 IM in 1:42.80. He beat out his former Michigan teammate Dylan Bosch, who took 2nd in 1:44.27. That’s in the “bubble range” for NCAA qualifying, but would have made Bosch safe last year. He’ll likely have no problem hitting his time in the 200 fly later in the meet.

Ann Arborites took three out of the top four spots, as Michigan freshman Evan White took 4th in 1:45.28.

Whiaker was able to out-split Bosch on the fly leg, and that’s a lead that Bosch won’t be able to make up on a true IM’er like Whitaker.

The Michigan men are swimming very well at this meet so far, but so too are the Louisville men. They took the 3rd and 5th place finish spots in the A-Final from Nolan Tesone (1:44.95) and Josh Quallen (1:45.48).

Princeton’s Teo D’Alessandro was 6th in 1:45.76.

Atop the B Final were a pair of NC State swimmers: Soeren Dahl in 1:46.66 and Colin Ellington in 1:46.70. That’s a lifetime best for both swimmers, and especially impressive for the freshman Ellington who is best known as a sprint freestyler but has underrated versatility.

Events Results Here (PDF)

WOMEN’S 50y freestyle – FINALS

• American Record: 21.27 03/19/2009 Lara Jackson
• U.S. Open Record: 21.27 03/19/2009 Lara Jackson
• NCAA “A” cut: 21.90

Tennessee’s Faith Johnson won an underwhelming women’s 50 free final in 22.12. That’s actually a very good time for Johnson and is the fastest that she’s been in December in her career (she was a 22.02 at the Nike Cup two weeks ago), as it was for UCLA’s Linnea Mack, who took 2nd in 22.15. Mack swam the two fastest times of her career in prelims and finals of this meet.

The tone of this final was a little odd; there were a lot of swimmers who had very good swims by their personal standards, but all-in-all, the race was lacking the talent we’ve seen in years past. For example, last season, the top 5 finishers were all under 22 seconds at this meet, and this year nobody was able to accomplish that.

Kelsi Worrell, the fastest swimmer in the morning heats and on the day overall (22.02) added almost half-a-second in finals with a 22.49. Michigan’s Ali DeLoof took 4th in 22.52, and Veronica Churchill was 5th

Event Results Here (PDF)

MEN’S 50y freestyle – FINALS

• American Record: 18.66 03/24/2011 Nathan Adrian
• U.S. Open Record: 18.47 03/27/2008 Cesar Cielo
• NCAA “A” cut: 19.25

Event Results Here (PDF)

Women’s 400 Medley Relay – FINALS

• American Record: 3:27.51 Stanford 3/20/2014
• U.S. Open Record: 3:27.51 Stanford 3/20/2014
• NCAA Qualifying Standard: 3:34.25

The Michigan women, with the most complete medley relay they’ve had in a long time, put together a 3:33.91 to win the women’s 400 medley relay, just beating out the Louisville Cardinals’ 3:34.35.

While the final time was close, these were two very different relays. On the leadoff, Michigan’s Clara Smiddy (52.26) opened up a big lead ahead of Hannah Magnuson (54.19) as the Louisville women continue to have problems on the front end of that medley relay.

The Cardinals made a lot of that ground up on the breaststroke leg when Andee Cottrell split 59.56 to the 1:00.10 of Michigan’s Emily Kopas.

Louisville’s Kelsi Worrell, on the verge of NCAA superstar status, split 51.11 on the fly leg to pull the Cardinals a full second ahead.

But that full second wasn’t quite enough as Michigan’s Ali DeLoof (48.02) edged past Louisville’s Andrea Kneppers (49.49) for the victory. That’s an NCAA Qualifying Standard for the Michigan women, while Louisville missed by a painful tenth. The Cardinals should have an equally good 200 medley relay, and will have a shot for both the win and the NCAA qualification there (which would then get this relay in, no-questions-asked).

UCLA had a good leadoff of 53.50 from Madison White and a good anchor of 47.97 from Linnea Mack to take 3rd in 3:36.31. SwimMAC Carolina took 4th in 3:38.15, and the UCLA “B” relay took 5th in 3:38.57.

SwimMAC’s two breaststrokers Katie Meili (59.00) and Micah Lawrence (59.48) had the two fastest breaststroke splits. The top “all-juniors” relay was from the Lakeside Swim Team, who placed 7th in 3:39.94.

Down on the 16th-place NCAP relay, Katie Ledecky split a 54.80 on the fly leg along with teammates Annie Boone, Natalie Purnell, and Hannah Baker. Baker, a high school junior, was a strong 54.82 on the leadoff leg.

Event Results Here (PDF)

Top two splits on each leg:

• back (#1 Smiddy, Michigan, 52.26; #2 Justine Ress, Indiana, 53.03)
• breast (#1 Meili, SwimMAC, 59.00, #2 Lawrence, SwimMAC, 59.48)
• fly (#1 Worrell, Louisville, 51.11, #2 Katie Grover, UCLA, 53.05)
• free (#1 Mack, UCLA, 47.97, #2 DeLoof, Michigan, 48.02)

Men’s 400 Medley Relay – FINALS

• American Record: 3:01.91 Stanford 3/26/2009
• U.S. Open Record: 3:01.39 Auburn 3/26/2009
• NCAA Qualifying Standard: 3:09.40

The Louisville men’s team may have graduated their best swimmer, double NCAA Champion Joao de Lucca, at the end of last season, a developing young nucleus of talent shows that they are a much deeper team this year.

That was demonstrated on Thursday evening when they took the #1 and #2 spots in the 400 medley relay at Winter Nationals. Their A relay cleared the NCAA Qualification standard by almost a second despite not even having the fastest split of the two relays on every leg.

The “B” relay was a 3:09.55 – almost a qualification standard as well.

Fomer European Junior Champion Grigory Tarasevich led off the A relay with a blistering 46.19 in the 100 back – which pushes the sophomore ahead of David Nolan for the fastest NCAA time in the country this season.

He was ahead of Aaron Greene (47.51), and that’s the reason the “A” beat the “B”.

On the breaststrokes, Thomas Dahlia was a 52.42 on the “A” relay and Addison Bray was a 52.60 on the “B” relay; on the flys, Pedro Coutinho (46.70) swam the “A” and Aaron Young (46.28) swam on the “B” relay; and the freestyle legs featured Caryle Blondell (43.21) on the “A” and Matthias Lindenbauer (43.16) on the “B”.

Ohio State placed 3rd in 3:10.04, and Michigan was 4th in 3:11.26.

The best two splits on each leg of the medley relay:

• backstroke (#1 James Wells, Badger Swim Club, 46.11; #2 Tarasevich, Louisville, 46.19)
• breaststroke (#1 Richard Funk, Michigan, 52.36; #2 Dahlia, Louisville, 52.42)
• butterfly (#1 Aaron Young, Louisville, 46.28; #2 Coutinho, 46.70)
• freestyle (#1 Michael DiSalle, Ohio Sate, 43.14; #2 Lindenbauer, Ohio State, 43.16)

Event results here (PDF)