Cal would-be-sophomore Cierra Runge will sit out the 2015-2016 Olympic season, instead choosing to spend the year at Arizona State training with her former club coach Bob Bowman in preparation for the 2016 Olympic Trials
During her rookie season with the eventual NCAA Champions from Cal, Runge made an immediate impact as the 2nd-fastest 500 yard and 1650 yard freestyler in the NCAA last season. While neither of her season-best times came at the NCAA Championships, she did score silver medals in both races and picked up 49 individual points, which was second among freshmen only to Simone Manuel’s 57.
She also broke the NCAA Record at the 2015 Pac-12 Championships in the 500 free, though eventual national champion Leah Smith would later break that record at NCAA’s.
In the summer before her freshman season, while still training with Bob Bowman at his then North Baltimore Aquatic Club, she qualified to swim the 400 free individually and part of Team USA’s 800 free relay at the 2015 World Championships. At those championships, concluded less than a month ago in Kazan, Russia, Runge swam a 4:07.97 in prelims to finish in 9th place and miss advancing to the final. That’s as compared to the 4:04.55 that she went to make the team. She also split a 1:58.65 in the preliminary heats of the 800 free relay, a relay that went on to win gold in the finals.
Bob Bowman was an assistant coach with the 2012 U.S. Olympic men’s team, and Runge’s coach at Cal Teri McKeever was the head coach of the 2012 U.S. Olympic women’s team. Also joining Bowman’s non-collegiate group at Arizona State will be Olympic gold medalists Michael Phelps and Allison Schmitt, along with the fastest 200 yard IM’er in history David Nolan.
No, the NCAA does not need to change anything. Let the few swimmers who are great enough to swim for the Olympics focus on that. They’ll be welcomed back at their colleges later if they so chose. And let the rest of the swimmers who are good enough to swim in college focus on that.
This is a great decision not only for Cierra, but for Allison Schmitt also! Phelps has Kalisz among others to train with for Rio, but Allison was more or less on her own; now Cierra and Allison can push each other in training for the 400 and 200 free and hopefully Team USA will benefit from the day-to-day competition! Good luck Cierra and Allison!
The NCAA needs to figure out a way to align itself more with international competition in Olympic years. Basically, all the best female swimmers are sitting out the 2016 NCAA’s
Just for the Teri naysayers here lol it seems McLaughlin, Baker & Bilquist have already started their classes at Cal.
Don’t know about Pelton, Bootsma, Osman, Thomas or Garcia at this point.
I’m not a McKeever naysayer.
At least I’m happy you didn’t write “hater”. I’m so tired of that word. 🙂
I just note that Missy, Rachel, Marina, Elizabeth and Cierra have moved backwards in long course since they swim in college and train at Cal.
That’s just a fact.
Missy has had her 2 worst long course seasons the 2 years she was at Cal.
Elizabeth and Rachel have disappeared in the last 2 years.
Marina had a breakout long course 2013 season with 2 world finals. She goes to Cal and disappears.
Cierra had a breakout long course season in 2014 while she trained at NBAC with Schmitt, Schmidt and Friis and… Read more »
Don’t worry Bobo you are still golden in my books haha. Comment was more directed at Pol and his merry posse lol.
Those are all valid points but I think it’s unfair to point fingers solely at McKeever. For example one could make a case that superstud Manuel hasn’t seem to progress much either in long course since going with Meehan @ Stanford. The bigger issue I believe lies with the inflexibility of the NCAA system.
If it may set your mind more at ease, Bears will only participate in 3 SCY duals this fall. There will be a shift to some multi-team & multi-day long course competition, notably the Minnesota Arena Pro Swim Series in Nov followed by… Read more »
Trying to avoid the “Missy Franklin” syndrome no doubt . . . Does not speak well of her confidence in the abilities of the Cal coaching staff to prepare her for Oly Trials.
Yes! Very smart decision.
If only Katie McLaughlin, Elizabeth Pelton, Rachel Bootsma, Ryan Murphy, Amy Bilquist or Simone Manuel could do the same… 🙂
My first thought when I read this news was that it would make BoBo Gigi very happy!
I do not think Elizabeth Pelton, Rachel Bootsma, Ryan Murphy, Amy Bilquist, or Simone Manuel would be any faster training under Bowman.
CraigH, you didn’t understand very well what I said. I’ve never mentioned Bowman about all the names above.
I only said hopefully x, y or z will redshirt this season to focus entirely on long course and maximize their chances for olympic trials and Rio. Where? Bootsma, Pelton and Murphy with the pro group at Cal. Same for Manuel at Stanford. Bilquist in her current club of Carmel. And McLaughlin at Mission Viejo.
Maybe the entire Cal women’s swim team should red shirt this season so they can train for long course and improve technically in preparation for the Oly trials and Rio. The entire team is great! The only way to ensure that these great Cal swimmers do not swim slower is to seek other coaches who can really help each swimmer prep, rather than be coached by those old school negative coaches with too much on their plate, including their pro team in addition to the college team, etc. Can swimmers really improve in this environment? Or do they have to move away like Missy Franklin and Cierra Runge?
I forgot Baker too! Should have stayed at SwimMAC.