Katie Ledecky blew up her home club invite Friday night, putting up a 1:41.04 in the 200 yard freestyle that moves her to #3 all-time in the event.
Ledecky’s swim itself is the 4th-fastest ever recorded for a woman of any age, sitting behind two separate swims from American record-holder Missy Franklin and one from Olympic champ Allison Schmitt:
Top 5 All-Time Women’s 200 Freestyles
- Missy Franklin – 1:39.10 (2015 NCAA Championships)
- Missy Franklin – 1:40.31 (2014 NCAA Championships)
- Allison Schmitt – 1:40.62 (2015 American Short Course Championships)
- Katie Ledecky – 1:41.04 (2015 NCAP Invite)
- Missy Franklin – 1:41.09 (2015 Pac-12 Championships)
Franklin’s 1:39.10 is the American record, and her 1:40.31 is the official 17-18 National Age Group (NAG) record. Ledecky now sits #2 all-time for the 17-18 age group, passing up Simone Manuel‘s 1:41.15 from the Pac-12 Championships last spring.
Ledecky has until March to try to take down the NAG – she turns 19 on March 17. Now graduated from high school, Ledecky won’t have the DC Metro Champs meet, which usually caused her to focus on short course yards through the spring, so it’s hard to say how often she will swim in the short pool between now and then – with the Rio Olympic Games upcoming, it’s certainly likely Ledecky will be turning her focus to long course meters sooner than usual.
Still, though, Ledecky may only need one more swim to challenge the NAG record the way she tends to drop time. Tonight’s swim was a drop of half a second from her previous lifetime-best.
You can check out video of her race above, courtesy of Meghan Thompson.
Katie’s 4:01.69 400 IM swim was also impressive.
Very!!! Thanks WahooSwimFan I hadn’t caught that. 4:01 would be roughly equalling her age peer (and future Stanford teammate) Ella Eastin, both times faster than the NC2A winning time last year.
I thought she would be the fastest ??
Nice swim in a beautiful pool. In a natatorium. In a university. With no swim team. With an alum who owns under armor. Who is associated with the GOAT. Who wants to make a big impact swimming, which could be done by getting UA to get behind swimming at Univ of Maryland. Instead of maybe having so many alternate uniforms for the football team.
More seriously, thanks for the video.
And if you had the 400 IM too, then it would be magical!
I think she would have won that race at US juniors whether it be in West or in East.