In our Weekly Wonders of Age Group Swimming series, we celebrate the swimmers of every age and experience level by profiling several young swimmers and their recent results.
Truman Armstrong, 16, Austin Swim Club (ASC-ST): 16-year-old Armstrong had a stellar meet at the Bob Thompson Halloween Spectacular. Armstrong hit six career-best swims. A 1:47.84 in the 200-yard back is probably most notable, representing a 4.2-second drop from his previous best. Armstrong also cut a second to 51.52 in the 100 back, almost four seconds to a 1:38.59 in the 200 free, a second to 45.86 in the 100 free and about half a second to 21.57 in the 50 free.
Alex Shackell, 13, Rockwood Swim Club (RSCA-OZ): The 13-year-old Shackell crushed three big lifetime-bests in Rockwoods’ third fall intrasquad meet. She was 51.06 in the 100-yard free, sitting just outside of USA Swimming’s all-time top 100 for the 13-14 age group. Shackell was also 2:02.81 in the 200 back and 59.61 in the 100-yard IM. The backstroke drop was about seven seconds from her previous best.
Jillian Cox, 15, Austin Swim Club (ASC-ST): Another swim from a fast Halloween Spectacular in Austin. Cox went 9:47.54 in the 1000-yard free, one of three personal-bests for her this week. That’s an eight second drop and moves Cox into the top 100 of all-time for the 15-16 age group. Cox also cut 1.4 seconds to go 52.89 in the 100 free and 2.4 seconds for a 58.68 in the 100 back.
Colin Zhang, 14, Patriot Aquatic Club (PAC-IL): In Illinois, 14-year-old Zhang went 56.84 for a new lifetime-best in the 100-yard breaststroke. That’s a huge time drop – Zhang’s previous best was just 1:00.99 from January. He also hit new lifetime-bests of 2:05.32 in the 200 breast and 1:59.78 in the 200 IM. He moves to #19 all-time in the 13-14 age group in the 100 breast and to #72 all-time in the 200 breast.