Colorado Stars’ Missy Franklin, who is the 200m backstroke world record holder and one of America’s great freestylers of this decade, swam breaststroke on the Stars women’s 200 medley relay on the first night of the Plantation Southern Zone Sectionals in Florida.
Franklin split a 32.91, which converts to a 28.74 SCY– not too bad for a backstroker/freestyler. That was just one relay– she also swam on the women’s 200 free relay and the mixed 200 free and 200 medley relays. Franklin split a 25.78 anchoring the women’s 200 free relay, which won the event. The Stars got a 25.56 split from China’s Tang Yi, who won bronze in the 100 free at the 2012 Olympics.
The two teamed up again to help the Stars take the mixed 200 free relay, both splitting 25’s again but a touch off of their earlier splits. The most exciting relay was the mixed 200 medley relay, where the Stars had a sizable lead going into the last leg. Franklin worked hard to hold off Eric Geunes of Gator Swim Club, splitting a 25.68 to his 24.03. The Stars took the victory, 1:52.64 to 1:52.89.
South Florida won the women’s 200 medley, propelled by a very fast 30.87 breast split from Jamaican Alia Atkinson and a 26.35 fly split from Claire Donahue.
Meanwhile, Azura Florida Aquatics won both of the men’s relays. Italian sprinter Nicolo Ossola had the big splits for Azura, clocking a 28.42 on the breast leg of the medley and then a team-fastest 23.18 on the 2nd leg of the 200 free relay.
The only individual events contested tonight were the men’s 800 and the women’s 1500. Azura’s Marcelo Acosta, who at the Orlando Pro Swim Series made history as the first swimmer from El Salvador to qualify for the Olympics with an ‘A’ cut in the 1500 free, went 8:06.67 to win the 800 free. He won that race by over thirty seconds.
The women’s 1500 was also a blowout win, as Seacoast Swimming Association’s Kate Magill went 17:29.99 for first. The 16-year-old won by almost twelve seconds over 2nd place, which ended up being a tie between Pine Crest’s Audrey Mason and Arizona Aquatic Club’s Irena Putikova.
What’s going on with the site since it’s birthday?
Looks like there’s a new system of comments but I’ve remarked that some comments were not placed in the right articles.
Other thing and much more important to me, since these changes, I can’t easily post comments anymore.
Reminder of my problems: for a long time now, I have big problems of browsing on the website which blocks very often. The problem has been detected and that’s a Javascript problem. I’m not a specialist but I’ve found a temporary solution for more than 2 months to navigate roughly by blocking Javascript on the website. It roughly works, it’s not perfect because I can’t watch videos or reply anymore but… Read more »
It’s mind boggling that Acosta, an Olympic qualifier for the men, only went .01 faster than Katie Ledecky’s best in the 800.