2023 SPEEDO GRAND CHALLENGE
- May 26-28, 2023
- William Woollett Aquatics Center
- Irvine, CA
- LCM (50 meters)
- Results on MeetMobile: “2023 CA NOVA-Speedo Grand Challenge”
Katie Grimes blazed her fastest 800-meter freestyle time since the Tokyo 2021 Olympics at the Speedo Grand Challenge on Sunday in Irvine, California.
The 17-year-old Sandpipers of Nevada standout reached the wall in 8:21.87, touching first by nearly 15 seconds ahead of club teammate Claire Weinstein. Grimes hasn’t been that quick since the Tokyo Olympics two years ago, when she posted a personal-best 8:17.05 in the heats before placing fourth in the final (8:19.38). Those are the only sub-8:20 swims of her career.
Grimes now ranks as the eighth-fastest woman in the world this season and the second-fastest American behind Katie Ledecky (8:13.56).
2022-2023 LCM Women 800 Free
Ledecky
8:07.07
| 2 | Li Bingjie | CHN | 8:13.31 | 07/29 |
| 3 | Ariarne Titmus | AUS | 8:13.59 | 07/29 |
| 4 | Simona Quadarella | ITA | 8:16.46 | 07/29 |
| 5 | Isabelle Gose | GER | 8:17.95 | 07/29 |
Notably, Grimes was a few tenths quicker than the 8:22.72 she clocked at last April’s International Team Trials. She didn’t swim the 800 free at last year’s World Championships, but her time on Sunday would have placed her fifth in the 2022 final.
Grimes’ 8:21.87 was her fastest time of the year by a wide margin, having gone 8:27.73 in January and 8:26.22 in April.
She also triumphed in the 400 free (4:08.57), 400 IM (4:38.01), and 200 fly (2:09.68) over the weekend while earning a runner-up finish behind Sandpipers teammate Bella Sims in the 200 IM (2:12.67) on Friday, just .01 seconds off her lifetime best.
A two-time World Championships silver medalist in the 1500 free and 400 IM, Grimes qualified for Worlds last year in both the pool and open water. Only one American has ever competed in both the pool and open water during the same Olympics (Jordan Wilimovsky, 2016).
Adlington’s best 400 when she swam 8:14.1 in the 800 was 4:02.2.
Friis’ best in the 400/800 were 4:03.9/8:15.9
Evans was 4:03.8/8:16.2
Wang Jianjiahe was 4:03.1/8:14.6
… I think there’s plenty example of ~4:03 swimmers that swim 8:14 – 8:16 in the 800free that those 400free and 800free efforts are roughly equivalent for athletes that can places equal efforts on both and are equally talented in the two.
The next logical step is saying that 4:00.00 roughly converts to something in the 8:10-8:12 range (which is just an matter of doing the subtraction and some conservative multiplication) and probably something on the faster end of that range. This is how I came to the conclusion that Titmus’ 800free potential is… Read more »
Please educate us as to who all the “elite” femele swimmers are that you are referencing as NOT swimming the 800 Free. In the freestyle realm, there have been tremendous swimmers just in the US who have swum it (Ledecky, Evans, Bennett, L. Smith, Ziegler, Hoff, Woodhead, Sandeno, Schmitt, Sullivan, Sutton, Grimes, H. Anderson). There have been “elite” swimmers like Pellegrini and Hosszu who used to swim it, and then backed off when they saw what Ledecky was doing. Who did not swim it whom you think had the freestyle capacity to swim it? Sjostrom and McKeon and Manuel tried to swim up just to the 200 Free LCM and were not long-term successful there at a much shorter distance.… Read more »
You’re missing the point and mistaking me for someone more incendiary than I really am.
My point is that there was a decent amount of women who have gone ~4:03 and 8:14-8:16. Therefore I suspect that someone who is equally talented at the 2 distances (and choose to focus across the 2, unlike Titmus) and could get close to 4:00 could possibly challenge the 8:10barrier- Grimes looking like a good candidate
Apologies for the sensitive choice of the word “elite”. I’m not trying to downgrade anyone’s achievements. 4min has been a formidable barrier throughout history even though there’s a lot of talent in the 400right now- I’m just drawing a comparison to the 800- even though less people are swimming… Read more »
2023 World Championships (LCM)
Women’s 800 Freestyle
Gold: K. Ledecky 8:07.94
Silver: A. Titmus 8:13.84
Bronze: K. Grimes 8:14.96
Katie Grimes could match her personal best time (8:17.05) and potentially win the bronze medal.
The final for the 400 Free is gonna be stacked. Ledecky, Grimes, Sims, Gemmell, Smith, Weinstein, Cox, Gormsen. Maybe in that order…?
Leah Smith’s time of 4:03.16 posted at the 2022 USA Swimming International Team Trials is still faster than the personal best times of aforementioned high school athletes.
She’s gonna get the 400/800/1500 spots behind Ledecky.
Leah Smith hasn’t relinquished her spot in the W 400 FR behind Katie Ledecky.
Smith hasn’t looked as good so far this year.
What about Weinstein?
As is the case with the W 200 FR, it’s wide open after Katie Ledecky.
https://www.swimcloud.com/times/?dont_group=false&event=1400&event_course=L&gender=F&page=1®ion=country_USA&year=2023
It’s now all about the taper.
I’m so torn on that 400. I lean Grimes, but I’m not discounting Weinstein either. Grimes has been 4:05 twice in the individual 400 but she has also taken out the 800 with a 4:05 before. Sims and Gemmell could also contend, but I lean heavily to either Grimes or Weinstein.
Sims’s 4:28.6 in the 500 suggests she’s gonna be 4:01 or faster. I have a hard time believing she’s only capable of a 4:06, when she’s been 1:54.6 in a 200 split, and 8:22.3 in the 800…
Throw out the SCY performances.
800 & 1500 – Yes. 400 = still looks very open. As yet, she has not put down the times that states “it’s mine”.
I suspect we’re going to learn soon that going sub 8:10 in the 800free is no more difficult than going sub 4 in the 400free
Highly doubt that. Only Ledecky has been sub-8:13 and Titmus is the only one besides Ledecky sub-8:14.
Ariarne’s best time in the W 800 FR is 8:13.59 (LCM).
It really doesn’t seem like Ariarne trains specifically for the 800. She sees the event somewhat like Chalmers sees the 200- is Good enough at it and can pop a decent time, but there are faster times possible if they invested fully in the event.
As numerous posters have suggested, the depth in women’s distance is lower than other events. It’s hard to believe given McIntosh’s talent (and Titmus) that the wouldn’t be sub8:10 if the 800 were their main events
There has been plenty of depth in women’s distance swimming–actually perhaps more than in sprint swimming. It has just been outshined by Ledecky’s long-held dominance and consistency. Just look at the list of distance swimmers Ledecky has swum against during the course of her career–Ziegler, Hoff, L. Smith, Sutton, Grimes, Sullivan, Adlington, Friis, Pellegrini, Belmonte, Carlin, Quadarella, Boyle, Kapas, Kohler, Bingjie Li, Jianjiae Wang, Melverton, Fairweather, Pallister. By saying there is no depth, you are insulting a long list of swimmers from the past decade, many (perhaps 1/2 or more) with Hall of Fame level credentials, Let alone insulting other all-time greats like Ledecky, Evans, Gould among others who swam additional events/distances other than just distance free.
That’s just not true. Women’s distance freestyle has the least participants of any category of swimming by a large margin, has the least competition, and outside of Ledecky, time progress has been minimal in the last decade. Janet Evans’s time from 1989 would have won silver last year: the fastest 50 and 100 free times from that year would not have even qualified for worlds.
And just to be clear, the 400 is mid-distance, not distance, so a lot of those swimmers aren’t even distance swimmers. I have never heard Pellegrini referred to as a “distance swimmer” in my life. Swimmers like Titmus and Hoff are mid-distance swimmers who stretched to the 800.
I disagree with John that an 8:10… Read more »
Pellegrini had three international podiums in 800m Free prior to Ledecky era, regardless of what you have heard her called. The point about Evans’ times show just how elite a swimmer she was, amidst great competition. And also how elite Ledecky has been. Argument about sprint times progression is silly given legalization of inhalers, swimsuit developments, adderall and anti-depression med TUEs, creatine supplementation, PRP injections, eating disorders (strength to weight ratios), among other things–all of which have much less bearing on distance swim times. You wanna denigrate the likes of Shane Gould, Debbie Meyer, Evans, Bennett, Adlington, Friis, Hosszu, Pellegrini, Ledecky—go ahead and look silly.
8:17.05 at the age of 15 years 201 days is nuts, that puts her at #2 all time in the 15-16 age group ranking, just 0.07 faster than Janet Evans’ age group record set at 16 years 206 days and over 5 seconds faster than anyone else in the age group (Bella Sims is 4th with 8:22.36 from when she was a month off of turning 17)
Hopefully she gets to win a gold in the event at some point although the timing might get tight if Ledecky continues to swim through the LA Olympics and the next generation of distance swimmers starts coming up
She can beat Ledecky just needs to get down to the 8:10/12 range. As Ledecky ages she get a little less consistent is what I notice so she is definitely beatable. And by consistent what I mean is she will swim one of her events at a high level but the other distances the times don’t correlate to the one fast swim. So maybe she does a fast 200 but her 1500 seems to be way off or vice versa. okay go ahead and downvote me but see what happens at worlds.
I get you’re saying but right now there’s nobody else is on Ledecky level on the the long distance events especially in 800 free and to go 8:10/12 is not gonna be enough given what we’ve seen from Ledecky last year and to have maybe a chance you’re probably gonna have to go below 8:10 and maybe between 8:09 to 8:06 which nobody else can do it right now except her .
And going to Florida to train with Finke seems pretty much improved her long distance speed.
I’m going out on a limb. Katie Ledecky will challenge the Championship Record (CR) in the W 800 FR at the 2023 World Aquatics Championships.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QLRLeOeq3w
idk about this year or even next but if Grimes progresses decently well, I think she definitely has a shot at surpassing Ledecky in the 2025-2028 quad, assuming Ledecky keeps going of course. I’d imagine that Grimes will be able to go in the 8:10 – 8:12 range in those years if she focuses on the event- she’ll be 19 to 23, about the average peak female distance swimmer age, while Ledecky will be 28 to 31 which is quite old for distance swimming.
Like I don’t wanna underestimate Ledecky but at the same time, a 31 year old going faster than anyone has gone in the 800 just seems ridiculous. Although I guess Phelps did go 1:54.6 in… Read more »
I think from what we’ve seen this year older swimmer like Sjostrom and McKeon still looks good going into their thirty and the only way we’re going to see new winners in 800 is if Ledecky retiring or dropped the events and if she swimming then she’s pretty much guaranteed to win.
8:04 is really fast.
Sprinting is a complete different beast. Adlington was 19, Shibata was 22, Bennett was 20/16, Evans was 20/16, and Michelle Ford was 18, which covers the 1980 to 2008 Olympics. Looking at Worlds, Adlington was 21, Friis was 21, Ziegler was 19/17, and Stockbauer was 21, which covers all of the WC from 2003 to 2011.
That’s a median of 19.5 or mean of 19.2 with a standard deviation of about 2 across these 12 major international gold medalling ages. 31 is just such an extreme outlier that idk its hard for me to see that, especially with Grimes being such a prodigious distance swimmer
Hey don’t forget Tiffany Cohen! 🙂 17 I think.
Talking about a legend who went 8.08:04 at the age of 25!!! And who has made all past great-distance swimmers look at her in admiration is just absurd to me.
It’s unbelievable that it’s gonna be 11 years since she went unbeaten in 800 free since 2012 and she’s likely gonna become the first woman to win a sixpeat in an individual events at world championship.
Katie Ledecky would be vying for a six-peat in the W 1500 FR if Katie Ledecky did not become ill at the 2019 World Aquatics Championships.
My only wish now is for her to join Phelps in the Four-peat club come next year.
Katie Ledecky posted a 15:37.99 in the W 1500 FR in the month of January. Nobody posts a Top 25 All-Time Performance in the W 1500 FR in the month of January except for Katie Ledecky.
She could three-peat the 1500 if she keeps swimming up till 2028.
Yes it’s a different event but she is showing no sign of slowing down and Sarah Sjostrom going fast with 50 fly is just like Ledecky going fast in 800 free and looking at the times right now nobody else can come close to her time or even going below 8:10.
Its also already an outlier looking at 800 free right now that we have a swimmer that is pretty much unbeaten going back to 2012 and pretty much gonna be unbeaten going into next year Olympics.
5 years is a long time, Lochte was at his peak in around 2011 with an insane 200 IM world record and missed out on any individuals in Rio. All I’m saying is that it is very much not unlikely that Ledecky will be surpassed by another distance swimmer in 4-5 years time
Maybe but right now I just don’t see any younger distance swimmer somehow is on the rise and there could be a someone in 4 or 5 years but it will be hard to beat Ledecky if she decides to continue until LA 2028 .
Katie Ledecky could post a 8:11.00 in the W 800 FR, which is far cry from the 8:08.04 posted at the 2022 World Aquatics Championships, and still win by 2.5 seconds.
Katie Ledecky is showing no signs of slowing down:
https://staging.swimswam.com/katie-ledecky-swims-1501-41-1650-yard-free-to-break-u-s-open-and-american-record/
“going 8:10” is a big ask Jeff, let’s talk about the 8:14.10 only one swimmer has managed to go faster than that other than Ledecky. So 8:10 my guy that’s gonna take another talent.
So what?
You blatantly missed Friis and Boyle in the more onerous W 1500 FR event.
Katie Ledecky is not dropping the W 400 FR, W 800 FR, W 1500 FR after dropping the W 200 FR.
Nesty >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Meehan
Katie Ledecky
2023 World Aquatics Championships
W 400 FR – heats, final
W 1500 FR – heats, final
W 4 x 200 FR-R – final
W 800 FR – heats, final
Yeah it seems ridiculous but it’s possible and we see older swimmer nowadays looks fast and Ledecky is a specialist when it comes to long distance events and looking at her 29 fastest times in 800 free, I think she could very well go unbeaten until she’s retired.
At the age of 27, Sarah Kohler posted her personal best time in the W 1500 FR en route to a bronze medal at the Tokyo 2021 Olympics.
https://www.worldaquatics.com/swimming/rankings?gender=F&distance=1500&stroke=FREESTYLE&poolConfiguration=LCM&year=all&startDate=&endDate=×Mode=ALL_TIMES®ionId=all&countryId=
You see now, Katie Ledecky might keep on swimming till 2028
Katie Ledecky will swim as long as she wants.
Yeah if other swimmer can do it going into their thirty then Ledecky certainly can do it too if she’s decided to for it.
She’s not beating Ledecky or McIntosh. If she wants an Olympic gold, she needs to focus on the 10k Open Water race. She’s faster than Sharon and Ana Marcela, and I think the only person who could really give her a race is Lani Pallister, but she didn’t even put herself in the running for the OW Worlds team.
Katie Grimes can focus on whatever she wants not what you say.
“Just” needs to get down to 8:12….
Not for a bronze medal.
I can’t wait to see the Sandpipers of Nevada taper at the 2023 Phillips 66 National Championships.
You must have outdated or incomplete 15-16 age group data. Ledecky was 8:14.63 at age 15 and 5 months in winning gold in the 800m Free at the 2012 London Olympics.
He says she is second all time 15-16?
The 15 year old world age group rankings:
Ledecky, Katie – 8:14.63 (2012 Summer Olympics)
Bingjie, Li – 8:15.46 (2017 World Aquatics Championships)
As with the case of Bingjie, let’s see if Grimes can at least match her personal best time at the age of 15.
I’m more interested in her 200free and 200IM to see if she can compete in the shorter races.
Doubt she swims the 200 IM – I *think* she’s got the 1500 on that day at Trials. I think she can get top 6 in the 200 free, she barely missed it at trials last year. It will be tough though – Ledecky, Gemmell, Sims, Weinstein, Madden, Peplowski, Hayes, Smith…etc; – the 200 free looks to be much deeper than it was last year at Trials. I also think she would have a great 200 Fly. She’s fairly “slow” in season compared to the big meets and has been 2:08 this year — and takes out her 400 IM in nearly under a minute. She seems to have the perfect combo of speed and endurance to have a great… Read more »
She can do prelims of the 200IM and the 200fly but likely not finals as they conflict with the 800/1500fr. She could breakthrough in her 200 races they must seem like sprints to her.
Not if it risks her chances in the W 800 FR and W 1500 FR.
Katie Grimes will have a full plate at the 2023 Phillips 66 National Championships.
Katie Grimes
2023 Phillips 66 National Championships
Day 1 – 800 FR
Day 2 – 200 FR
Day 3 – 400 IM
Day 4 – 400 FR
Day 5 – 1500 FR
Katie Grimes has far better chance qualifying in the W 800 FR and W 1500 FR than the W 200 FL (Flickinger, Smith) and W 200 IM (Walsh, Hayes).
The W 200 FR at the 2023 Phillips 66 National Championships is wide open after Katie Ledecky.
Trials: 8:12
WC: 8:08
Paris: 8:02
why not sub 8:00 while you’re at it?
That 8:08 is going to be tough and that world record is going to be surprised of the meet if it’s get broken at Paris.