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Zane Grothe Wins 400 FR in 3:44.4 to Become 7th Fastest American Ever

2017 U.S. NATIONALS/WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS TRIALS

Coming into the 2017 U.S. Nationals/World Championships Trials, it looked like a 3-man race for 2 spots in the men’s 400 free. One of those men, Zane Grothe, stepped up to the challenge tonight to win the race with a personal best 3:44.43, taking over a second off his former best time.

Grothe took off after the first 100 meters and never looked back, taking down the Texas duo of Clark Smith and Townley Haas by over a second. Smith took 2nd to grab the next Worlds spot in 3:45.91, while Haas followed in 3rd with a 3:46.41.

Before today, Grothe was the 8th fastest performer in American history with his 3:45.60 from Olympic Trials in 2016. Tonight, he moved ahead of Haas to become the 7th fastest American ever. Haas is now 8th on the all-time top American performers list, while Smith remains at 9th.

All-Time Top 10 American Performers:

1 Larsen Jensen 3:42.78
2 Peter Vanderkaay 3:43.11
3 Conor Dwyer 3:43.42
4 Connor Jaeger 3:43.79
5 Erik Vendt 3:43.92
6 Klete Keller 3:44.11
7 Zane Grothe 3:44.43
8 Townley Haas 3:45.04
9 Clark Smith 3:45.74
10 Dan Madwed 3:45.95

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Wolf
7 years ago

Why is bob hating on GA? They also got a couple Canadians on the worlds team..

Aussie crawl
7 years ago

Australia v Italy in the mens distance events.
Sun Yang or Park in the 200.

bob
7 years ago

Indiana seems to be swimming pretty well at this meet. Zane, Miller, King, Pieroni. Not a bad showing. What other schools had 4 or more make the WC team?
Georgia – Kaliz, Litherland, smoliga, ???
Cal – Adrian, Murphy, Pebley, (no shields), Baker, ??? (no Weitzell)
Stanford – Sweetser, Neal, Manuel, Ledecky,
Longhorns – Conger, Haas, Smith, ???

With one day left, pretty clear who’s doing a great job developing team USA’s talent

Zanna
Reply to  bob
7 years ago

Georgia – Flickinger, Smoliga, Kalisz, Litherland, Fink, Margalis

Vst5911
Reply to  Zanna
7 years ago

Clark for GA also

Zanna
Reply to  Vst5911
7 years ago

Oh yes. Wow, 7 for Georgia. Impressive.

Nah
Reply to  bob
7 years ago

I think you need to separate the men’s and women’s teams for Indiana and Cal. not sure they all swim for the same coach.

Georgia actually has the most swimmers qualify all under Baurle

bob
Reply to  Nah
7 years ago

Agreed about Cal – I believe Looze coaches both men and women

marklewis
7 years ago

He swam it like a man on a mission.

He makes the World team in an individual event and got a PB by over a second.

Congratulations, Zane!

About Braden Keith

Braden Keith

Braden Keith is the Editor-in-Chief and a co-founder/co-owner of SwimSwam.com. He first got his feet wet by building The Swimmers' Circle beginning in January 2010, and now comes to SwimSwam to use that experience and help build a new leader in the sport of swimming. Aside from his life on the InterWet, …

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