Matt Richards Breaks British 14-Year Olds Record in 100m Freestyle

2017 SWIM ENGLAND NATIONAL WINTER CHAMPIONSHIPS

• Wednesday, December 13th – Sunday, December 17th
• Ponds Forge, Sheffield
• LCM
• Commonwealth Games selection at stake
• Meet Central
• Entry Lists

British 14-year old Matt Richards has broken another British Age Record ahead of his 15th birthday later this month. Swimming on Friday, the 3rd day of the Swim England Winter Championships, Richards touched in 52.44. That broke thee 2013 record of Englishman Craig McLean, who swam 52.53 that summer for the old record for 14-year olds in Britain.

It also put Richards, who competes under the Welsh flag when Great Britain is sub-divided for competition, just a tenth-of-a-second short of the Welsh Junior Record (available to swimmers through the age of 15). That record belongs to Ieuan Lloyd, who swam 52.34 in 2009.

This swim is a two-second drop for Richards, whose previous best from the 2017 British Summer Championships was a 54.47.

This meet is normally a short course meet but this year a special long course edition. That’s given Richards 2 chances to swim long course at a time of year where short course meters is the more common course of competition, after the Welsh Winter Championships 2 weeks ago where he broke the British 14-year olds record in the 200 free as well.

For the sake of comparison, Richards’ time would rank him as the 10th-fastest American 13-14 in this event ever, behind Michael Andrews’ NAG Record of 51.30.

Richards’ 200 free time of just 1:53.14  earlier in the meet was well short of his best in that event. He also swam a 57.39 in the 100 fly, and a 25.75 in the 50m fly.

Note: though Richards is listed as being 15-years old in the meet results, he doesn’t turn 15 until the end of the year. British Records are determined by age as of date of the start of the meet.