Brazilian butterflier Vinicius Lanza has signed a National Letter of Intent to swim for the Indiana Hoosiers, beginning in the spring of 2016.
In Lanza’s best event, the 100 fly, he swam a 53.02 at the Brazilian Open Championships in December, which ranks him as the 8th-fastest 18 & under swimmer in the world in the 2014-2015 long course season. That includes being just two-tenths of a second behind the best time of Andrew Seliskar, the top-ranked swimmer in the American high school class of 2016 (although Seliskar’s ranking is based on a lot more than the one event).
That time converts to 46.50 in yards, according to the Speedo Time Converter, which if it held true would make him a likely NCAA qualifier as a freshman.
Lanza’s best long course times (that we can find), and their yards conversions:
- 100 fly – 53.02 (46.5)
- 200 fly – 2:01.46 (1:46.9)
- 200 IM – 2:05.04 (1:49.76)
- 400 IM – 4:26.62 (3:54.43)
” The first thing that made me think about coming to the US was all the structure and opportunites that are offered for the athletes, because in Brazil we don’t have these things,” he said.
“But the most decisive thing was the opportunity to go to a nice college at the same time to swim at a high level. When Indiana offered me that chance I felt really proud and happy, and when I visited there I felt at home and that was really decisive to me.”
His addition will be a boost for an Indiana team that didn’t have a single swimmer under 47 seconds in the 100 yard fly last year. Their top two were Max Irwin as a sophomore (47.21) and Joe Powell as a senior (47.33) on flat starts. Though Irwin came through with a very good 46.5 split in prelims at NCAA’s, the Indiana relay still finished 17th in the 400 medley relay at NCAA’s to miss the scoring finals by less than three-tenths of a second.
In the least, Lanza’s presence should give Irwin some competition and a training partner for that spot; if not, it gives the Hoosiers the sub-46-second relay split that would get them into at least a B-Final as part of a relay that didn’t graduate any of its four parts after last season.
Lanza will compete later this summer as part of Brazil’s team for the Junior World Championships in Singapore.
The Indiana men are developing a very diverse international roster, with now swimmers from the Netherlands, Slovenia, Egypt, Croatia, Canada, Australia, and now Brazil on their 2015-2016 roster.
Great pickup for Ray and Dennis!