Captured and edited by Mitch Bowmile
Reported by Loretta Race
MEN’S 100 FREE
Team USA earned its 3rd consecutive win, with Nathan Adrian charging to the wall in a time of 46.57 for the victory. Adrian split 21.88/24.89 to clock the swiftest mark of the field. A field which included 5 sub-47-second times tonight. USA’s Josh Schneider cranked out a speedy 46.66, followed by Russia’s Vladimir Morozov, who touched just .02 behind in 46.68.
For Adrian, he chose the right time to turn it on, as his 46.57 tonight was his 2nd-fastest clocking of all-time in the SCM of this event. He’s only been quicker in 2010 at the World Championships where he swam away with a time of 46.44. Schneider, this summer’s Pan American Games 50m freestyle title winner, also broke ground tonight, earning his first sub-47 mark of his career. Together they added 8 points to USA’s total.
MEN’S 400 MEDLEY RELAY
In the final event of the day, the men’s relay of Matt Grevers, Kevin Cordes, Tom Shields, and Nathan Adrian broke the American record, winning the event in 3:20.91. That broke the previous American record from 2010 of 3:20.99. Grever’s lead off split also broke the US Open record in the men’s 100 backstroke. He touched at 49.25, lowering his own record from 2011 of 49.85.
Shields, fresh off his rattling of the world record, blasted a 48.07 on the fly leg, and Adrian outsplit Vlad Morozov 45.56 to 45.66 to cap off the win.
The European relay was made up of Arkady Vyatchanin, Daniel Gyurta, Laszlo Cseh and Morozov, and went 3:21.87. Gyurta put the team into the lead with a 56.38 breaststroke split, but he was the only European to outsplit his American counterpart and Shileds erased the lead almost instantly.