This week on the SwimSwam Breakdown, we discuss Leon Marchand‘s NCAA record in the 400 IM, UVA’s event lineup for NCAAs, and suiting up at dual meets. See full list of topics below:
- 0:00 SwimSwam Breakdown Introduction
- 0:55 ASU Dual Meet Initial Thoughts
- 2:43 Leon Marchand 3:31 400 IM in January – How do you contextualize that?
- 10:03 Sink or Swim Suiting Up for Dual Meets?
- 19:40 What is the ideal NCAA Event Lineup be for G Walsh, A Walsh, and Kate Douglass?
SINK or SWIM
- 25:04 Is seeing top times in January going to be a new trend in the NCAA?
- 32:30 Will Bob Bowman be tabbed for the head Olympic coach in 2024 or 2028?
- 38:57 Will Kyle Chalmers Swim other individual events at the 2023 World Champs besides the 100 free?
- 42:50 If you could pick ONE current college swimmer, male or female, to start an NCAA team around, who would it be?
As much as I would like to see the potential for them to win 9 individual events and have no overlap, I just don’t see Alex Walsh NOT swimming the 200 IM at NCAAs. I think maybe she’ll do the 500 at ACCs to get a time, but the 200 IM is her bread and butter event.
At the same time, considering that she’s only a junior, I could see them putting her in the 500 Free over the 200 IM since she still has next year, but no way she doesn’t swim the 200 IM at her final NCAAs next year. It will likely be one of her last SCY 200 IMs and I think she takes it… Read more »
Here are my thoughts with UVA lineups:
Alex Walsh: 500 Free, 200/400 IM.
500 free is very weak right now, and I think Walsh has a pretty good chance at winning it. The 200 and 400 IM races are her’s also, and maybe Douglass…?
Kate Douglass: 50 FR, 200 BR, 200 IM.
I think we are all ignoring the fact that the 100 fly is going to be the race where Kate may not even make the podium. MacNeil is fresh off of her WR in the SCM 100 Fly, Huske is fresh off of a AR in the 100 LCM fly, and Curzan had looked sharp in the 100 fly also. Her best chance at winning or… Read more »
I don’t think they’ll have Alex so the double. Especially because she’s so versatile and good at the 200s, she’ll be in at least one of them (really pick any stroke and she’s excel) on the last day of the meet. Most likely the 200 fly, though.
Weyant wasn’t good in the 500? She was literally 2nd last year and her 400 IM was 4th. I don’t really see your argument there Braden. I think this year’s distance group is a lot weaker, so there is a huge chance that we could see someone win the NCAA title in the 500 at 4:34-4:36. I see Walsh swimming this since it’s so weak right now and I think she could easily win it. It’ll be a race between her, Sullivan, McMahon, and Weyant.
I wonder if any of these swimmers we argue about ever read this website peanut gallery comments.
Constantly. They mention it sometimes in interviews. (They should never read the comments.)
Pretty sure a bunch comment under pseudonyms, too.
Other possible subjects of interest:
- Any impact of the “redshirt everyone” ASU strategy a few years back.
- Both teams generally swam well in their chosen Fall Invite, but with ASU’s in late November and Cal’s Minnesota Invite 2 weeks later, if their training blocks are of similar duration, ASU might be pretty naturally “coming out from under” 2-3 weeks later than Cal. Cal swims fast in dual meets, just a couple of weeks later in its rivalry meet with Stanford. Look at their dual meet performances in that meet over the last several yars. A good article might be to do up a dual meet comparison with ASU from this weekend against Cal v Stanford. Who would win
… Read more »I remember Remedy Rule getting.a DQ in the 200 fly one year at NCAAs for being underwater too long on one of the lengths. I think when you’re at the level where you need to know EXACTLY how many kicks gets you to a 15m breakout and you have your stroke count per each length planned out to nail turns and finishes, you need to race in a tech suit to be sure that you’re right. I still think when a swimmer nails a taper and is wearing a new tech suit, it opens the possibility that kicks and stroke counts shift in a way that could be hard to anticipate and prepare for.
Honestly if you think of 3:33 SCY as 4:08 LCM equivalent … If Leon is capable of 4:03LCM, the equivalent SCY is probably something like 3:28.
If you compare Kalisch to Leon I think the times line up pretty well. 3:33 to 3:31 and 4:06 to 4:04. If you use Hugo you get a big discrepancy.
Hugo seems one of the most inconsistent great swimmers of the age; in just his freshman year at Auburn he crushed at the SECs 4IM: 3:35.76; NCAA’s were only 3:46.19. I’m not privy to any information on any health issues in that gap, but absent such an issue, that is an unusual spread. 3 1/2 months after his monster 3:32+ SCY 4IM, he went to LCM World swimming 4 events, placing 19th in the 50 Back, 11th in the 100 Back(after having been 6th in Olympics), 13th in the 200 Back, and 12th in the 200 IM. With no 400 IM on his program.
I don’t think it’s really worth trying to line up one to one times for top performers. Chase was 3:33 & 4:05 in the same year and he’s obviously not an elite underwater swimmer, Seliskar was 3:36, but never even focused on the 4IM after high school, Finke was 3:36 & 4:10, Hugo was 3:32 but also didn’t seriously pursue the LC version, and Carson was 3:33 & 4:06 in the same year. Think you just have to look at general improvement curves and combine that with some analysis of why they’re going faster.
The predictions after Léon’s 1:37 were way out there in the 4IM because we all looked at that as his better event. The 4:04 at the… Read more »
I have to agree with Yanyan. The 4im record was after several races in 2 days…why would that be a peak performance?
Cause Marchand is proof of alien life
it’s probably not peak performace, but (contrary to seemingly popular belief) Marchand isn’t going a 3:28 at NCs, lol