By Jared Anderson on SwimSwam

It’s that time of year again where we at SwimSwam rank out the top 20 high school swimming prospects in the upcoming NCAA recruiting class.

As college recruiting has reached earlier and earlier into high school classes, we’re continually expanding our recruiting ranks and coverage. Last spring, we ranked out the then-sophomore class. This is essentially a re-rank of that class, taking into account a year of improvements. Stay tuned to our recruiting channel for more additions to our yearly recruiting coverage:

• Boys & Girls ranks for current juniors – high school class of 2021 (updated rankings from our “Way Too Early” rankings last spring)
• Way Too Early ranks for current sophomore boys & girls – high school class of 2022
• Re-Rank of outgoing senior boys & girls – high school class of 2020

Further reading:

• Way Too Early NCAA Recruiting Ranks: High School Boys Class of 2021 (as ranked last spring)

So without further ado, let’s take a look at this class as a whole, then review our ranking methodology (please read it before you get upset about how low the top miler is ranked!) and get into our rankings.

2020 addendum: We anticipate the counterarguments already: ‘So-and-so missed their taper meet due to coronavirus!’ ‘These ranks will give an advantage to swimmers who had their high school seasons in the fall!’ ‘We can’t possibly know how fast so-and-so would have gone!’ The questions, of course, are valid. But the best we can do is take the information we have now and make our best ‘snapshot’ rankings. If we’ve made a tweak this year to account for coronavirus cancellations, it’s taking long course improvement curves a little bit more into account – if someone came up with big long course drops last summer or at U.S. Open, that’s potentially the most recent data point we have, and can help us identify fast risers. And trying to predict who was and wasn’t tapered isn’t a new phenomenon this year. With that in mind, the point of these rankings is discussion, and we’ve now got a whole new layer of analysis to discuss in the comment section this time around.

THIS CLASS

• A class incredibly tailored to the NCAA format – multi-stroke sprinters abound
• Very sprint-based class – 50/100 a lot stronger than 200
• Relatively light in distance swimmers at the top
• Great class for 200 IMers
• Tons of fast risers
• Not a terribly deep fly group
• A lot of big-time long course swimmers as well

Last year, we noted how good of a sprint class this was, and they’ve only gotten better. The top swimmers in the class in the 50 and 100 frees are the fastest juniors we’ve seen since Ryan Hoffer in the class of 2017. And what really makes this class stand out is how well swimmers transfer their speed between strokes. If we had to classify each swimmer in an event discipline, we’d probably consider three of our top four prospects as ‘general sprinters’ rather than confining them to one stroke or another.

On the flip side, this isn’t a great distance class. Every year, we seem to get at least one high school standout who is below 15 minutes in the mile – in fact, you have to go back to the Class of 2014 before you find a group without a miler under 15. That shortage in this class extends down to the 500 (where no one is under 4:20), and the 200 is slightly weaker than previous classes, relatively speaking.

Rather than 200 freestylers, though, this group is stacked with 200 IMers. It feels like every other recruit has a 1:47-or-better IM in their back pocket, often as a bonus event along with their main specialty. The IMs tend to show the most improvement from the high school level to the college level (consider that according to last year’s NISCA All-American lists, only five high schoolers of any grade broke 1:46 in the IM, while it took 1:43.0 just to score at 2019 NCAAs), so we’d expect this class to yield some eventual superstars. We may be entering an era where 1:39-or-better gets much, much more common at the NCAA meet.

This class is also rising extremely fast as a whole. Last year’s juniors were surprisingly hit-or-miss based on time changes from our sophomore ranks to our junior re-rank. But this class had a whole bunch of junior-year explosions, even with some athletes missing meets due to the coronavirus pandemic.

If there’s a stroke that gets short shrift here, it’s probably fly. There are a lot of versatile types that cross over into fly, but not many pure flyers in our ranks.

We’ve also got a good amount of big-name long course swimmers, though there aren’t as many of the great-at-long-course-but-only-OK-at-short-course types we usually see (and struggle hard to rank accurately).

**The 1000 free isn’t an event at the Division I NCAA Championships, but is swum instead of the 1650 in many Division I dual meets and is part of the NCAA program in Division II.

THE METHODOLOGY

Our goal in these rankings is to reflect what college coaches look for in recruits, based on many years of conversations and coverage.

We focus only on American-based athletes, simply because there is so much uncertainty with international recruits – if they’ll come to the states, when they’ll come to the states and with what graduating class they should be ranked. Projecting international recruits often becomes more a discussion of when they’ll first join a college program and not which program they’ll join.

A few other factors that weigh heavily in our rankings:

• Relay Value – Relay points count double in college swimming, and any program needs a strong stable of quality sprinters to fill out all 5 relays with studs. Obviously, a special distance swimmer can easily rank ahead of a very good 100 freestyler, but college swimming generally values a sprint freestyler over a distance swimmer, all other factors being equal.
• Improvements – Actual times are a the trump card, but any big improvements in quality can make a difference as well. For example, a swimmer who only took up year-round swimming as a junior in high school going the same time as a swimmer whose been swimming year-round since they were 8 will probably get the edge in our rankings. Think Breeja Larson.
• Short Course over Long Course – we recognize that some programs, many programs, put their focus with their high school aged swimmers on long course, especially depending on when the high school championships may fall. That said, college swimming is short course, so a swimmer who is great in short course but struggles in long course will have the advantage over the reverse.
• NCAA scoring ability – NCAAs are the big show for college teams, so we’ve weighted NCAA scoring potential very highly. Swimmers who already have NCAA scoring times wind up mostly filling out the top our of rankings. Since college athletic directors – and by extension coaches – also place high value on conference championships, scoring ability at conference meets is also a factor in our rankings.
• Relative depth in the NCAA and recruiting class – a wealth of elite depth nationwide in one stroke discipline makes a big difference in what times are considered more valuable in that event. Events rise at different rates in the NCAA, but when one event gets extremely deep and fast at the college level, it makes high school prospects in those events a little less valuable, relatively, with lots of other veteran options. In the same way, a recruiting class stacked with swimmers in butterfly, for example, would make each butterflyer a little less sought-after in the market, with lots of other recruiting options able to provide similar production.

Of course, there’s no way to predict the future, and the most concrete data we have to go on are cold, hard times. These rankings in no way mean that all of these 20 swimmers will be NCAA standouts, and they certainly don’t mean that no swimmer left off this list will make big contributions at the NCAA level.

With that out of the way, let’s get to our rankings.

Disclaimer: there are a lot of high school seniors in the country, and no really good, complete, 100% accurate listing of them all. If you don’t see your favorite swimmer on the list, feel free to politely point them out in the comments. There’s a chance that we disagree with your assessment of their spot in the top 20, and so long as it’s done civilly, there’s no problem with differences of opinions. There’s also a chance that we’ve simply missed a no-brainer (we’ve taken every precaution to avoid that), and if that happens, we want to make sure we correct it.

TOP 20 SWIMMERS FROM THE CLASS OF 2021

1.Aiden Hayes (Previous Rank: #2) – Sooner Swim Club – Norman North High School – Norman, OK **Verbally committed to NC State**
Best Times: 100 fly – 46.01, 200 fly – 1:41.34, 50 free – 19.58, 100 back – 46.31, 100 free – 44.01

Hayes surges into our #1 rank, in large part because of monstrous improvements to his 200 fly. At this time last year, Hayes was a pure 50/100 type with a 46.6 100 fly but only 1:47 200 fly. He’s blown out both times, going to 46.0/1:41.3, and the latter of those times actually would have scored at 2019 NCAAs. A few factors bumped Hayes over Grimm for the time being. His top three events fit together very nicely in the NCAA format. The 200 fly development shows way more range than we thought he had a year ago. And Hayes has the better 50 free and significantly better 100 free, which adds a lot more relay value. Here’s Hayes’ lifetime-best 100 fly (lane 5 with the blue cap) – he’s got awesome turns and a picture-perfect butterfly. There’s also valuable room for improvement, though. His underwater kicks seem to lose steam and there’s a little drop in intensity between his kickout and his breakout stroke. The 200 fly is the same (blue cap, lane 4) – he went straight from 1:47 to 1:41 in a single day, and he’s going to have plenty more time to drop with experience and polishing in that race. And just for fun, here’s his 50 free (blue cap, lane 5), where you get a better picture of how good his underwaters are, and where he does a better job transitioning between his dolphin kicks and his breakout stroke.

2.Anthony Grimm (Previous Rank: #1) – Mason Makos Swim Team – Oakton High School – Fairfax, VA **Verbally committed to Texas**
Best Times: 100 back – 45.60, 100 breast – 52.51, 50 free – 19.67, 100 fly – 47.40, 100 free – 46.59

Grimm is probably one of the best pure athletes we’ve ever seen in these rankings. He’s got unparalleled fast-twitch strength, high-level underwaters, and a crazy sprinting ability across all four strokes. Here’s his lifetime-best 100 back from last spring. (Grimm is in lane 4 in the white cap with no logo – you’ll know which one he is by the start alone). He’s got a brilliant backstroke start, and one big factor that you don’t see above is how good Grimm is in the 50 back. As a sophomore, he went 20.8 leading off a 200 medley relay. That would have been the 5th-fastest split in the entire NCAA meet a month later and gives him another avenue for relay impact early in his career. Grimm has two things working against him in this year’s ranks. He dealt with a back injury this year and missed some training, which led to a lack of time drops in his high school season. And based on his

By Coleman Hodges on SwimSwam

While the world is taking mandatory time out of the water, we’ve been looking back at some really awesome races. And luckily, NBC, FINA, and other tele-providers have been helping us by putting up race videos from the vault. Todays comes from the 2007 Duel in the Pool, which was not only against Australia (later renditions were against the “European All-stars”) but was also long course.

It was the mixed 400 free relay (did not realize they had that event in 2007) and the Aussie’s opted for the Female-Female-Male-Male Strategy, while the USA put 2 women in the middle and bookended with their males, the first of which was Michael Phelps. This put Phelps up against Libby Lenton. I won’t spoil the end for you if you’ve made it this far.

Read the full story on SwimSwam: The Woman Who Went Head-to-Head with Michael Phelps in Open Competition

By Daniela Kapser on SwimSwam

Der Deutsche Schwimmverband (DSV) hat auf seiner Homepage nun den zweiten Teil der dreiteiligen Serie zum Thema Coronoavirus und dessen Einfluss auf Sportler veröffentlicht.

Prof. Dr. med. Alexander Beck erläutert erneut Fragen rund um das COVID-19 Virus, mit einem besonderen Fokus auf Fragen von Sportlern. Prof. Dr. Beck ist nicht nur Chefarzt der Klinik für Orthopädie, Unfall- und Wiederherstellungschirurgie im Juliusspital Würzburg, er ist auch der leitende Mannschaftsarzt im DSV für das Freiwasserschwimmen. Ebenso gehört der Mediziner der DSV-Taskforce an, die für den Verband den Umgang mit der Coronavirus-Pandemie steuert. Außerdem ist Dr. Beck der Vater der Schwimmerin Leonie Beck, die bereits für die Olympischen Spiele 2020 in Tokio über die 10 km im Freiwasser qualifiziert ist. Auch ihr jüngerer Bruder, Sebastian, ist ein erfolgreicher Schwimmer.

Professor Beck erläutert in dem zweiten Video Antworten sehr spezifische Fragen, wie: “Was bedeutet die plötzlich fehlende Belastung durch Schwimmhallen-Schließungen etc. ganz konkret für Stoffwechsel und Nahrungseinnahme?” Professor Beck empfiehlt, die Ernährung anzupassen, damit das Gewicht nicht in die Höhe schnellt, denn ohne das Hochleistungstraining werden weniger Kalorien verbrannt.

Prof. Beck geht auch auf eine Bemerkung eines Wissenschaftlers des IAT Leipzig (Instituts für Angewandte Trainingswissenschaft) ein. Ulf Tippelt ist der Direktor des Instituts, das Athleten aus 21 Spitzenverbänden fast 220 Tage im Jahr auf Wettkämpfen begleitet. Tippelt warnt in  dem Artikel, das “die Gefahr besteht, wenn die Corona-Krise länger währt, dass dann die Perspektive, die Leistungspyramide und der viele Jahre vollzogene Leistungsaufbau unterbrochen wird. Das wird unwiderrufliche Schäden nach sich ziehen“. Prof. Dr. Beck kommentiert diese Aussage: “Dem ist sicher zuzustimmen. Doch nicht nur im deutschen Leistungssport haben wir dieses Problem, es besteht weltweit. Hier ist es nun Aufgabe der Trainer, für ein alternatives Trainingsprogramm zu sorgen, welches sicher nicht ideal ist, aber zumindest den Athlet*innen die Möglichkeit gibt, sich weiter zu betätigen, um einen zu heftigen plötzlichen Trainingsverlust durch “Nichtstun” zumindest partiell auszugleichen.”

Als Alternativen zum fehlenden Wassertraining, empfiehlt Dr. Beck, sich mit den Trainern abzustimmen. “Hier muss sicher zwischen Sprintern und Langstreckenschwimmern unterschieden werden. Die Langstreckensportler sollten sich eher auf ein Ausdauertraining konzentrieren und 50m-Freistilsprinter wird eher mehr Krafttraining machen.”

Sein persönlicher Rat in der vollkommen ungewohnen Situation: “Bleibt gesund, munter und zuversichtlich, denn Optimismus mag dieses Virus nämlich gar nicht.”

Eine schriftliche Zusammenfassung findet sich auf der DSV Homepage.

Hier ist das Video mit dem zweiten Teil:

(Quelle: DSV, Youtube)

Read the full story on SwimSwam: Coronavirus: Spezifisches FAQ für Sportler – mit Prof. Dr. Beck, TEIL 2 (Video)

By Reid Carlson on SwimSwam

Though Mark Spitz is best known for winning 7 gold medals in swimming at the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, he also had a legendary NCAA career as a student-athlete at Indiana University from 1968 to 1972.

Though Spitz was already an Olympian and Olympic medalist from the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City, the ’68 Games were far from the result Spitz had hoped for. Fortunately, Spitz was young and had his entire NCAA swimming career ahead of him, which he chose to spend at Indiana University under the tutelage of Doc Counsilman, who was also his Olympic coach in Mexico City.

Spitz’s first season as an NCAA student-athlete swimmer was also the first year in NCAA history that freshmen were allowed to swim at the NCAA Championships, meaning Spitz would get four goes at history on the national stage and not just three like his predecessors.

The video below shows some of Spitz’s best individual swims as an NCAA student-athlete. Some of the most interesting differences between the swimmers then and now include the techniques used for starts, the number of swimmers per heat, and of course, the “ordinary” swimsuits and the lack of caps and goggles.

Mark Spitz‘s Individual NCAA Titles, 1969-1972 (SCY)

*The commentator notes that Spitz went a 4:33.2 in the prelims. Spitz is swimming in lane 3 for the final, but the pool only has 6 lanes which makes the swimmer in lane 3 the top seed.

Read the full story on SwimSwam: Watch Mark Spitz Race at the NCAA Championships, 1969-1972

By SwimSwam Staff on SwimSwam

TritonWear  and Swim Swam are bringing you the best in swimming race analysis. With the power of TritonWear, you can have an in-depth analysis of your practice every day with zero effort. Today we are having a closer look of one of the fiercest duels of 2012 London Olympic Games.

It was predicted the men’s 100 freestyle final in 2012 could be the race of the Olympics. Australia had high hopes for James Magnussen, who was seemingly unbeatable heading into London. He’d dominated at World Championships the year prior and set the fastest time ever in a textile suit at the Australian trials with a 47.10.

But doubts were raised after Nathan Adrian of the United States beat Magnusson head-to-head on the opening leg of the 4 x 100 freestyle relay early in the competition. While the Aussie qualified first for the 100m freestyle individual final, Adrian’s potential threatened an upset. Other big contenders in the final included Yannick Agnel, who had come from behind on the anchor leg of the relay to propel France to the top of the podium, and César Cielo of Brazil, who already had a number of international titles under his belt.

The final was hyped to be an epic showdown between multiple competitors, but most of all the Australian favorite and the American underdog. When the beep sounded, the swimmers exploded off the blocks and charged down the pool with high stroke rates and powerful kicks. Adrian’s rate was faster at 1.14 seconds per stroke while Magnusson held 1.25 s/str, giving the American a slight edge.

While the field was nearly dead even for most of the first length, some swimmers began to surge ahead coming into the wall. Known for his front-end speed, Cesar Cielo of Brazil was the first to flip in a time of 22.60. He was followed closely by Brent Hayden of Canada and Nathan Adrian in third position. Adrian flipped faster than anyone else at the front of the pack with a turn time of 0.79, launching him into a strong second length.

Magnusson was two-tenths of a second behind the leaders at the first wall, which was still within striking distance; he blasted ahead with a speed of 2.02 m/s to fight Adrian for the win. The last fifteen meters turned into a dogfight, with no clear leader even as they powered into the wall. Magnusson had the advantage in efficiency, but Adrian held a slightly higher stroke rate that made the difference.

It was Adrian who got his head down at the finish and touched in 47.52, managing to secure the victory by the narrowest of margins: 0.01 seconds. In upsetting “the Missile”, he shattered the hopes of the Aussies and became the first American to win the 100 freestyle since 1988. Touching for bronze was the wildcard Hayden, who also made history in becoming the first Canadian male ever to claim a medal in the 100 freestyle at the Olympics.

TritonWear is revolutionizing training with data-driven coaching. Check out how coaches in Texas are putting down their stopwatches and focussing solely on stroke mechanics.

With TritonWear, you can explore your practice with an in-depth analysis every day with zero effort and track your progress throughout the season. Train smarter with TritonWear.

_{Swimming analysis is courtesy of TritonWear, a SwimSwam partner.}

AB

Read the full story on SwimSwam: Race Analysis: Men’s 100m Freestyle 2012 London Olympic Games

By James Sutherland on SwimSwam

In its first Board of Directors meeting of 2020, held on January 31, USA Swimming approved a new structure for its Flex Membership, effective for the 2021 Membership Year.

• Read the BOD minutes from January 31, 2020, here.

Introduced in 2018, the Flex Membership offered a reduced fee in exchange for lowered benefits, looking to attract athletes who were not year-round swimmers. The fee has been a flat $20 since the launch, but the new structure will see an increase for swimmers 11 & over.

In a BOD meeting on August 26, USA Swimming Chief Operating Officer Mike Unger outlined some of the issues with the membership, including the fact that “38-42%” of the organization’s total athlete membership doesn’t swim more than two meets. If all of those members were to convert to the Flex Membership, the organization would lose over $6 million.

Joel Shinoefield, USA Swimming’s Managing Director of Sport Development, provided membership projection assumptions at the latest meeting for both the current and proposed Flex Membership models. In terms of membership revenue, Shinoefield noted a “$6 million difference between the two models” based on a conservative 0% growth rate in athlete memberships.

The new model increases the fee for swimmers aged 11-12 to $35, with $25 going to USA Swimming and $10 to the LSC (previously it was a 10-10 split), and an increase to $45 (35-10) for those aged 13-18. All maintain the two-meet limit, while the 13-18 age group also has a 150-day maximum.

The approved Flex Membership structure, set to be implemented for the 2021 membership year, is as follows, per the BOD minutes:

• Ages 10 and Under: $20.00 ($10 USA-S, $10 LSC): “Two meets, multiple Flex registrations. This price matches the minimal dues clubs often charge for their entry-level/novice/pre-competitive programs and allows clubs to register these new athletes as USA Swimming members, rather than seek lower cost/lower-value options in the marketplace.”
• Ages 11-12: $35.00 ($25 USA-S, $10 LSC): “Two meets, multiple Flex registrations, no downgrades from Premium. This is an entry point for athletes who have possibly competed in summer league or other rec programs and are likely competing in other sports, which charge a similar membership fee.”
• Ages 13-18: $45.00 ($35 USA-S, $10 LSC): “Two meets, 150-day limit, multiple Flex registrations, no downgrades from Premium. This is an entry point for athletes coming from other sports, summer league, or middle school/high school swimming experiences. Also allows entire high school teams or summer league teams to join for a season.”

The minutes also show that USA Swimming was exploring how the novel coronavirus could impact training for the Olympics back in late January. Everything has changed since this meeting with the virus forcing the postponement of the Olympics until 2021.

The next BOD meeting is slated for April 24.

Read the full story on SwimSwam: USA Swimming Approves New Flex Membership Structure For 2021

By SwimSwam Partner Content on SwimSwam

Below are Fitter and Faster’s upcoming LIVE broadcasts for this week! FFT will have a full schedule each week. Follow Fitter and Faster on social media to stay informed about all #FFTLive.

Learning from Failure – Mental Skills Training: Monday, April 13: 4pm EST

For Swimmers Ages 13 & Older and Coaches

The best swimmers in the world use every experience, including failure, as a growing opportunity. Learn how to develop a growth mindset and become a stronger person.

Led by Olympic Gold Medalist Tyler Clary, Five-time Olympian Brett Hawke, and Founder of Fitter and Faster David Arluck

Register Now ( https://fitterandfaster.com/fftlive-registration/learning-from-failure-mental-skills-training/ )

Mindset Monday – Girls Only! Monday, April 13: 6pm EST

For Female Swimmers

Three elite swimmers and strong women will discuss common issues that girls face and how to become a more confident female!

Led by Olympic medalist Kim Vandenberg, Two-time Olympian Chloe Sutton, and Olympic Trials Qualifier Marina Spadoni

Register Now ( https://fitterandfaster.com/fftlive-registration/mindset-monday-girls-only/ )

Growing up in a Swimming Family – The DeLoofs: Tuesday, April 14: 5pm EST

For Swimmers, Parents, and Coaches

All 4 of the DeLoof sisters competed at the University of Michigan and have reached an elite level in swimming. Learn about this amazing family and what it’s like to have 4 elite swimmers in the same household!

Led by Five-Time Olympian Brett Hawke hosts Swimmers Ali, Gabby, Catie, and Jackie DeLoof and their Parents Richard and Patty

Register Now ( https://fitterandfaster.com/fftlive-registration/growing-up-in-a-swimming-family/ )

Breaking Down Breaststroke: Wed. April 15: 12pm EST

For Swimmers and Coaches

Breaststroke technique is so important to being able to generate speed and maintain momentum through the whole stroke. Learn from two expert swimmers and coaches on the most important components (as well as those often overlooked) of a fast breaststroke!

Led by Five-Time Olympian as a swimmer and coach Brett Hawke and SEC Champion Michael Duderstadt

Register Now ( https://fitterandfaster.com/fftlive-registration/breaking-down-breaststroke-2/ )

Will We Be Ready to Return to the Pool as Soon as it is Safe? Wed. April 15: 3pm EST

For Coaches, Parents, and Business Leaders in Swimming

Three leaders in the sport will ask questions regarding what “returning to swimming” could look like when it happens… and offer suggestions on how teams and families can prepare for the unexpected.

Led by Managing Director of Sport Development for USA Swimming Joel Shinofield, Olympic Gold Medalist and Co-Founder of SwimSwam Mel Stewart, and Founder of Fitter and Faster Swim Camps David Arluck

Register Now ( https://fitterandfaster.com/fftlive-registration/will-we-be-ready-to-return-to-the-pool/ )

Yoga for Swimmers: Wed. April 15: 5pm EST

For Swimmers of All Ages

Olympic medalist and certified yoga instructor Emily Silver will flow through a yoga practice designed specifically for swimmers to improve strength, balance, flexibility, and focus.

Led by Olympic medalist and Yoga Expert Emily Silver

Register Now ( https://fitterandfaster.com/fftlive-registration/yoga-for-swimmers-episode-2/ )

Breaking Down Freestyle: Thursday, April 16: 12pm EST

For Swimmers and Coaches

Freestyle is the stroke you swim more and any other! It is highly technical and can always be improved. Work through the mechanics of the pull, kick, rotation, breath, AND how each piece must fit together in order to create a strong and connected freestyle stroke.

Led by Olympic gold medalist Tyler Clary, Olympian Shane Ryan, and American Record Holder Tyler Messerschmidt!

Register Now ( https://fitterandfaster.com/fftlive-registration/breaking-down-freestyle/ )

Athlete Nutrition and Cooking Habits: Thursday April 16: 6:00pm EST

For Swimmers, Parents, and Coaches

Learn about the nutrients that can help swimmers have more energy during practice and racing, help build muscle, and aid in recovery! Then learn how to cook a recipe designed for athletes!

Led by Olympic gold medalist Cierra Runge and two-time Olympian Chloe Sutton

Register Now ( https://fitterandfaster.com/fftlive-registration/athlete-nutrition-and-cooking-habits-episode-3/ )

Breaking Down Front Starts: Friday April 17: 5pm EST

For Swimmers and Coaches

Learn the techniques of the fastest swimmers in the world and explode off of the blocks every time! Find your best starting position and what it takes to enter the water cleaner and faster.

Led by Five-Time Olympian Brett Hawke along with Four Time Olympian and Olympic gold medalist Roland Schoeman AND Paralympic Medalist Tucker Dupree

Register Now ( https://fitterandfaster.com/fftlive-registration/breaking-down-front-starts/ )

Stroke Video Analysis: Friday April 17: 6pm EST

For Swimmers and Coaches

Watching both perfect technique as well as watching technique that needs improvement can be greatly beneficial to swimmers learning the intricacies of technique required to race faster.

Led by Olympic gold medalist Tyler Clary and Coach Mike Murray

Register Now ( https://fitterandfaster.com/fftlive-registration/stroke-video-analysis-with-tyler-clary-episode-3/ )

Just Keep Swimming! Saturday April 18: 1pm EST

For Swimmers Ages 11 & Under

Let’s have some fun and just keep swimming! Watch this to keep swimmers 11 & under engaged with swimming and having fun!

Led by Olympic gold medalist Tyler Clary and NCAP Coach Dory Halbe

Register Now ( https://fitterandfaster.com/fftlive-registration/just-keep-swimming/ )

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Read the full story on SwimSwam: Fitter and Faster’s Free Live Broadcast Schedule For April 13-18

By Braden Keith on SwimSwam

The history books of swimming are littered with great names that never hit the pinnacle of the sport: the top of an Olympic podium. Some of these names you know, and some of them you may never have heard of.

The best way to ensure immortality in the sport of swimming is via a World Record. In a recent poll, 81% of SwimSwam readers said that they’d rather win an Olympic gold medal than break a World Record. Many of the swimmers on this list, however, have done just the opposite: broken World Records, but never won Olympic golds.

In fact, some swimmers on this list have never won an Olympic medal at all.

There are many explanations for these swimmers’ lack of Olympic gold. For some, the result is from running up against an absolute juggernaut for almost their entire career. Think Laszlo Cseh and his parallel with Michael Phelps.

For others, their best golden opportunities were interrupted by wars, boycotts, or national Olympic banishment for reasons that were no fault of the individual (think South Africa’s long-time Olympic ban due to apartheid). In the early part of the 20th century, it wasn’t uncommon for women to get married and start having children and never really get to chase their full Olympic potential, or for men to join military service.

For others, it was just bad swims at the worst moment, or perhaps an extreme specialty in either short course swimming or non-Olympic events, but enough success in those to warrant mention.

These swimmers, even without Olympic gold medals, are still worth celebrating, however. Below is a list of the 10 best female swimmers to have never won Olympic gold.

This list was collaborated on by the whole SwimSwam staff. We’ll admit that it does have a recency bias – but perhaps that is warranted, given how much deeper the sport has become in more recent years (an Olympic silver medalist in 2012 is probably better, even relative to their own time, than an Olympic silver medalist in 1912 was). We’ve also limited this to the modern Olympic era.

We’ve also included a list of names of other swimmers that would have strong cases for this list, in no particular order.

It’s likely that there’s a name we’ve forgotten that one of our readers will point out as an obvious miss. This is a little bit appropriate, given the topic: it’s fairly easy to identify the best swimmers who have won Olympic gold medals, because that list is much shorter than the one of swimmers who have not. Further, Olympic gold medals are a very easy way to define greatness of a career. Let us know who we missed, and if we agree, we’ll eat crow in the comments.

For the sake of argument, swimmers who have received a suspension for a banned substance or who admitted after their careers that they took banned substances, knowingly or not. We’ve also excluded swimmers who haven’t gotten a serious crack at gold yet – like Regan Smith and Rikako Ikee – though still active, but later-in-their-career, swimmers were considered.

10 Greatest Female Swimmers who have never won Olympic gold

10. Margaret Hoelzer, United States – Hoelzer represented the United States at the 2004 and 2008 Olympic Games, with her biggest and best performance coming in 2008. There, she took individual silver in the 200 back, individual bronze in the 100 back, and another silver as a prelims swimmer on the American 400 medley relay. In the year prior, she won the World Championship in the 200 back, and at the 2008 Olympic Trials, she broke the World Record in the 200 back.

9. Antje Buschschulte, East Germany – Buschschulte swam just after the closing era of the East German state doping regime, but denied any involvement – saying that as a member of the Madgeburg Sports School, she was subjected to more doping controls than others. In 1996, at 17-years old, Buscschulte moved from Hamburg in the West to Madgeburg in the East (she said at the time that she was drawn there by the sports school, which didn’t exist in the West). While the country was united by then, such a move was still unusual. It worked for her though: Buschschulte won 5 Olympic bronze medals in her career, including an individual bronze at the 2004 Olympic Games. She also won 10 World Championship medals in long course, an additional 5 in short course, and 4 total World titles. She was also a 17-time European Champion and 38-time European Championship medalist in her distinguished career.

8. Kate Ziegler, United States – For a period of time in the first decade of the 2000s, Ziegler was the undisputed best women’s distance swimmer in the world. She won back-to-back World Championships in long course in the 800 and 1500 meter freestyles in 2005 and 2007, and added a silver in the 1500 and bronze in the 800 at the 2011 World Championships. She also broke the 800 free Short Course World Record twice in 3 days in 2007. Earlier that year, she broke a 19-year old World Record in the 1500 free by almost 10 seconds. Despite all of those accomplishments, Ziegler neve swam in an Olympic final – her best performance was 10th place in the 800 free at the 2008 Games.

7. Therese Alshammer, Sweden – The first-ever woman to compete at 6 Olympic Games, the Swede Alshammar was an elite international-caliber swimmer from 1991, when she was 14-years old, through an Olympic semi-final appearance in the 50 free in 2016. She won her first World Championship medal in 1997 and her last in 2011, an individual gold in the 50 free a month shy of her 34th birthday. She won 3 Olympic medals at the 2000 Games, including individual silver in the 50 and 100 free. Over that extended period, she also won 2 long course World Championships (both individual), 10 short course World Championships, and 25 European Championships. Her 93 World Cup event wins remain the 3rd-most ever by a woman, and she won 3 FINA World Cup series titles. She also broke 10 World Records in her career, and remains the World Record holder in the 50 short course meters butterfly, set in 2009. Her World Records lasted for a long time too – she held the 50 fly in long course for all but 3 months from 2007 to 2014, the 50 free in short course for almost 8 years, the 100 free in short course in almost 6 years, and she’s held the 50 short course fly World Record for over 10 years consecutively.

6. Karen Muir, South Africa – In 1965, at 12-years old, Muir became the youngest person to break a sporting World Record in any discipline when she swam a 1:08.7 in the 110 yard backstroke at the ASA National Junior Championships in England. Over the next 5 years, she would break 15 World Records in the backstroke races. That’s in addition to 22 South African Championships, and 3 US National Championships. She was the World Record holder in the 100 meter back at the time of both the 1968 and 1972 Olympic Games, and the World Record holder in the 200 back during the time of the 1968 Olympic Games. Muir also has the best claim as the best swimmer to never compete at the Olympic Games – during her active career, there was a sporting boycott of South Africa over their apartheid policies, and South Africa didn’t compete at the Summer Olympics held from 1964 through 1988.

5. Cynthia “Sippy” Woodhead, United States – One of the all-time great age group swimmers, Sippy Woodhead broke the World Record in the 50 free in 1980 (it was broken the same day) and the 200 free World Record 3 times in 1978 and 1979. She was qualified to race 6 events at the 1980 Summer Olympics, but the American boycott derailed that. Even though she was still only 20 years old at the 1984 Olympics, she had several health problems in the interim, including mononucleosis, a broken leg, and pneumonia, and never quite recaptured her teenage form. She held the American Record in the 200 free from 1978 until 1992.

4. Martina Moravcova, Slovakia – Moravcova won a pair of Olympic silver medals at the 2000 Games, in the 100 fly and the 200 free, and had 5 long course World Championship medals, none of which were gold. She did win 5 long course golds at the World University Games and 3 more at the European Championships. While her long course accomplishments were worthy of a remarkable career, even without Olympic gold, it was short course racing where she left an indelible mark on swimming. She was a two-time winner of the FINA World Cup Series in 2002 and 2004, and prior to the advent of Hungary’s Katinka Hosszu (who has since nearly tripled Moravcova’s win total) she was the only swimmer male or female to win over 100 World Cup races. She is also a 7-time individual World Champion in short course meters, in 1998 set the World Record in the 100 IM, and in 2002 set the World Record in the 100 short course meters butterfly. All of the above was accomplished without the benefit of relays, of which Slovakia never had much to speak of.

3. Ragnhild Hveger, Denmark – Hveger’s best years were robbed of her due to geopolitics related to World War 2. Hveger won an Olympic silver in the 400 free in Berlin in 1936. After the next 2 Olympic Games were cancelled due to World War 2, Hveger was barred from the Danish team in 1948 as the daughter of a Nazi, sister of an east front volunteer, and wife of a German officer. She did compete at the 1952 Olympics, where she was part of Denmark’s 4th-place 400 free relay team and finished 5th in the 400 free. At 32 years old, she was at the time one of the oldest women to ever swim at the Olympics. She broke over 40 World Records in her career, including in 1941 where she simultaneously held World Records in 19 front crawl events. She was also a 3-time European Champion. In 1996, she was named Sportswoman of the Century by Danmarks Idræts-Forbund.

2. Katie Hoff, United States – At the 2008 Olympic Games, with the world’s focus on her North Baltimore Aquatic Club teammate Michael Phelps, 19-year old Katie Hoff had considerable pressure on her shoulders as well. Opting to skip college swimming to turn pro, Hoff in 2006 signed a 10-year endorsement deal with Speedo – longer than any deal Speedo had ever signed at the time, including Phelps. After winning a combined 6 gold medals at the 2005 and 2007 World Championships, Hoff seemed destined for a history-making meet at the 2008 Olympics. Everything felt right. She broke the World Record in the 400 IM at the U.S. Olympic Trials, plus the American Record in the 200 IM. Hoff wound up winning a silver and 2 bronze medals at those Olympics, which is a good tally by most standards, but not up to the weighty expectations that were placed upon her. After taking bronze to a red-hot Australian Stephanie Rice in her first race of the meet, the 400 IM, Hoff nearly ran-down Rebecca Adlington for gold in the 400 free. From there on, her times degraded as a huge schedule rolled on, culminating with missing the final in the 800 free. That was Hoff’s last-ever Olympic Team, though she continued to race until 2015, where health issues forced her to retire for good.

1. Franziska van Almsick, Germany – At the 1992 Olympic Games, the first after the reunification of swimming, a 14-year old Franziska van Almsick emerged as the country’s first great swimmer after the passage of the East German cloud, where every top female swimmer was under an understandable cloud of suspicion. There were rumors that a pre-teen van Almsick was doped without her knowledge, but those rumors were not substantiated with nearly the same fervor as her predecessors in the 1980s. Van Almsick holds the distinction of having won more Olympic medals, 10, than any other athlete without gold, in any sport. 4 silver and 6 bronze medals and back-to-back individual silvers in the 200 free in 1992 and 1996. She also won an individual World Championship in 1994 in the 200 free, and a whopping 22 European Championships (including 18 in long course).

Other Names We Considered

In no particular order, and not exhaustive.

Elizabeth Beisel, United States – 1 individual Olympic silver (400 IM, 2012) and 1 individual Olympic bronze (200 back, 2012). Beisel swam on 3 U.S. Olympic Teams in her career and was the 2011 World Champion in the 400 IM.

Hannah Stockbauer, Germany – Stockbauer won 5 World Championships from 2001 through 2003 in distance freestyle races. At the 2004 Olympics, though, her highest individual finish was 12th, in the 400 free. She also got a bronze medal as part of Germany’s 800 free relay.

Tracey Wickham, Australia – The 1978 World Champion in the 400 and 800 freestyles, Wickham withdrew from the 1980 Olympic Team with an illness (denying that it was out of protest, like other individual members of the Australian team did). She retired in 1979 because Australia forced its swimmers to remain amateurs and that forced her into financial problems. She returned to the pool and won 2 events at the 1982 Commonwealth Games before promptly retiring again. She never swam at the Olympics.

Samantha Riley, Australia – After sweeping the 100 and 200 breaststroke at the 1994 World Championships in long course, and again the next year at the World Championships in short course, Riley took matching bronze medals at the 1996 Olympic Games. She has a minor doping ding, but her coach Scott Volkers copped to giving her a headache pill, freeing her from more than a ‘strong warning.’

Kara Lynn Joyce, United States – Joyce was on the US 400 free and 400 medley relay teams at both the 2004 and 2008 Olympic Games. It’s rare that the American women go two-straight Olympics without winning gold in the same relay, but that’s just what happened to Joyce. In fact, at the 2008 Games, the U.S. didn’t win any relay gold medals.

Jopie Waalberg, Netherlands – Walberg was the first woman in history to swim the 200 breaststroke in under 3 minutes, and finished 5th in the 200 breaststroke at the 1936 Games when she was only 16-years old. The 200 breaststroke didn’t return to the Olympic schedule until 1968 – which probably didn’t matter, since the 1940 and 1944 Olympics, which would have been Waalberg’s prime, didn’t happen.

Satoko Tanaka, Japan – the 1960 Olympic bronze medalist in the 100 back, she set 10 World Records in the 200 backstroke in his career, but they came before the 200 backstroke was added as an Olympic event in 1968.

Olga Dorfner, United States – Dorfner was the first American woman to break a swimming world record when she did so in the 200 meter free and 100 yard free events. She never got a chance at the Olympics because of the cancellation in 1916 and childbirth in 1920.

Ilsa Konrads, Australia – Her only Olympic medal came in the 400 free relay at the 1960 Summer Olympics, but she set 12 individual World Records in her active swimming career.

Ariana Kukors, United States – Kukors never won an Olympic medal, but en route to the 2009 World Championship in the 200 IM broke the World Record in that event twice – lowering it by a whopping 2.30 seconds in total. That’s an almost-unheard-of pace in a 200 meter race in the modern era of swimming.

Read the full story on SwimSwam: Top 10 Women’s Swimmers Who Never Won an Olympic Gold Medal

By Coleman Hodges on SwimSwam

While the world is taking mandatory time out of the water, we’ve been looking back at some really awesome races. And luckily, NBC, FINA, and other tele-providers have been helping us by putting up race videos from the vault. Todays comes from the 2007 Duel in the Pool, which was not only against Australia (later renditions were against the “European All-stars”) but was also long course.

It was the mixed 400 free relay (did not realize they had that event in 2007): the Aussies opted for the Female-Female-Male-Male Strategy, while the USA put 2 women in the middle and bookended with their males, the first of which was Michael Phelps. This put Phelps up against Libby Lenton. She didn’t do so bad, considering: Phelps split 48.72, while Lenton touched at 52.99, unofficially becoming the first woman under 53 in the 100 freestyle.

Splits:

Read the full story on SwimSwam: The Woman Who Went Head-to-Head with Michael Phelps in Open Competition

By Jared Anderson on SwimSwam

It’s that time of year again where we at SwimSwam rank out the top 20 high school swimming prospects in the upcoming NCAA recruiting class.

As college recruiting has reached earlier and earlier into high school classes, we’re continually expanding our recruiting ranks and coverage. Last spring, we ranked out the then-sophomore class. This is essentially a re-rank of that class, taking into account a year of improvements. Stay tuned to our recruiting channel for more additions to our yearly recruiting coverage:

• Boys & Girls ranks for current juniors – high school class of 2021 (updated rankings from our “Way Too Early” rankings last spring)
• Way Too Early ranks for current sophomore boys & girls – high school class of 2022
• Re-Rank of outgoing senior boys & girls – high school class of 2020

Further reading:

• Way Too Early NCAA Recruiting Ranks: High School Boys Class of 2021 (as ranked last spring)

So without further ado, let’s take a look at this class as a whole, then review our ranking methodology (please read it before you get upset about how low the top miler is ranked!) and get into our rankings.

2020 addendum: We anticipate the counterarguments already: ‘So-and-so missed their taper meet due to coronavirus!’ ‘These ranks will give an advantage to swimmers who had their high school seasons in the fall!’ ‘We can’t possibly know how fast so-and-so would have gone!’ The questions, of course, are valid. But the best we can do is take the information we have now and make our best ‘snapshot’ rankings. If we’ve made a tweak this year to account for coronavirus cancellations, it’s taking long course improvement curves a little bit more into account – if someone came up with big long course drops last summer or at U.S. Open, that’s potentially the most recent data point we have, and can help us identify fast risers. And trying to predict who was and wasn’t tapered isn’t a new phenomenon this year. With that in mind, the point of these rankings is discussion, and we’ve now got a whole new layer of analysis to discuss in the comment section this time around.

THIS CLASS

• A class incredibly tailored to the NCAA format – multi-stroke sprinters abound
• Very sprint-based class – 50/100 a lot stronger than 200
• Relatively light in distance swimmers at the top
• Great class for 200 IMers
• Tons of fast risers
• Not a terribly deep fly group
• A lot of big-time long course swimmers as well

Last year, we noted how good of a sprint class this was, and they’ve only gotten better. The top swimmers in the class in the 50 and 100 frees are the fastest juniors we’ve seen since Ryan Hoffer in the class of 2017. And what really makes this class stand out is how well swimmers transfer their speed between strokes. If we had to classify each swimmer in an event discipline, we’d probably consider three of our top four prospects as ‘general sprinters’ rather than confining them to one stroke or another.

On the flip side, this isn’t a great distance class. Every year, we seem to get at least one high school standout who is below 15 minutes in the mile – in fact, you have to go back to the Class of 2014 before you find a group without a miler under 15. That shortage in this class extends down to the 500 (where no one is under 4:20), and the 200 is slightly weaker than previous classes, relatively speaking.

Rather than 200 freestylers, though, this group is stacked with 200 IMers. It feels like every other recruit has a 1:47-or-better IM in their back pocket, often as a bonus event along with their main specialty. The IMs tend to show the most improvement from the high school level to the college level (consider that according to last year’s NISCA All-American lists, only five high schoolers of any grade broke 1:46 in the IM, while it took 1:43.0 just to score at 2019 NCAAs), so we’d expect this class to yield some eventual superstars. We may be entering an era where 1:39-or-better gets much, much more common at the NCAA meet.

This class is also rising extremely fast as a whole. Last year’s juniors were surprisingly hit-or-miss based on time changes from our sophomore ranks to our junior re-rank. But this class had a whole bunch of junior-year explosions, even with some athletes missing meets due to the coronavirus pandemic.

If there’s a stroke that gets short shrift here, it’s probably fly. There are a lot of versatile types that cross over into fly, but not many pure flyers in our ranks.

We’ve also got a good amount of big-name long course swimmers, though there aren’t as many of the great-at-long-course-but-only-OK-at-short-course types we usually see (and struggle hard to rank accurately).

**The 1000 free isn’t an event at the Division I NCAA Championships, but is swum instead of the 1650 in many Division I dual meets and is part of the NCAA program in Division II.

THE METHODOLOGY

Our goal in these rankings is to reflect what college coaches look for in recruits, based on many years of conversations and coverage.

We focus only on American-based athletes, simply because there is so much uncertainty with international recruits – if they’ll come to the states, when they’ll come to the states and with what graduating class they should be ranked. Projecting international recruits often becomes more a discussion of when they’ll first join a college program and not which program they’ll join.

A few other factors that weigh heavily in our rankings:

• Relay Value – Relay points count double in college swimming, and any program needs a strong stable of quality sprinters to fill out all 5 relays with studs. Obviously, a special distance swimmer can easily rank ahead of a very good 100 freestyler, but college swimming generally values a sprint freestyler over a distance swimmer, all other factors being equal.
• Improvements – Actual times are a the trump card, but any big improvements in quality can make a difference as well. For example, a swimmer who only took up year-round swimming as a junior in high school going the same time as a swimmer whose been swimming year-round since they were 8 will probably get the edge in our rankings. Think Breeja Larson.
• Short Course over Long Course – we recognize that some programs, many programs, put their focus with their high school aged swimmers on long course, especially depending on when the high school championships may fall. That said, college swimming is short course, so a swimmer who is great in short course but struggles in long course will have the advantage over the reverse.
• NCAA scoring ability – NCAAs are the big show for college teams, so we’ve weighted NCAA scoring potential very highly. Swimmers who already have NCAA scoring times wind up mostly filling out the top our of rankings. Since college athletic directors – and by extension coaches – also place high value on conference championships, scoring ability at conference meets is also a factor in our rankings.
• Relative depth in the NCAA and recruiting class – a wealth of elite depth nationwide in one stroke discipline makes a big difference in what times are considered more valuable in that event. Events rise at different rates in the NCAA, but when one event gets extremely deep and fast at the college level, it makes high school prospects in those events a little less valuable, relatively, with lots of other veteran options. In the same way, a recruiting class stacked with swimmers in butterfly, for example, would make each butterflyer a little less sought-after in the market, with lots of other recruiting options able to provide similar production.

Of course, there’s no way to predict the future, and the most concrete data we have to go on are cold, hard times. These rankings in no way mean that all of these 20 swimmers will be NCAA standouts, and they certainly don’t mean that no swimmer left off this list will make big contributions at the NCAA level.

With that out of the way, let’s get to our rankings.

Disclaimer: there are a lot of high school seniors in the country, and no really good, complete, 100% accurate listing of them all. If you don’t see your favorite swimmer on the list, feel free to politely point them out in the comments. There’s a chance that we disagree with your assessment of their spot in the top 20, and so long as it’s done civilly, there’s no problem with differences of opinions. There’s also a chance that we’ve simply missed a no-brainer (we’ve taken every precaution to avoid that), and if that happens, we want to make sure we correct it.

TOP 20 SWIMMERS FROM THE CLASS OF 2021

1.Aiden Hayes (Previous Rank: #2) – Sooner Swim Club – Norman North High School – Norman, OK **Verbally committed to NC State**
Best Times: 100 fly – 46.01, 200 fly – 1:41.34, 50 free – 19.58, 100 back – 46.31, 100 free – 44.01

Hayes surges into our #1 rank, in large part because of monstrous improvements to his 200 fly. At this time last year, Hayes was a pure 50/100 type with a 46.6 100 fly but only 1:47 200 fly. He’s blown out both times, going to 46.0/1:41.3, and the latter of those times actually would have scored at 2019 NCAAs. A few factors bumped Hayes over Grimm for the time being. His top three events fit together very nicely in the NCAA format. The 200 fly development shows way more range than we thought he had a year ago. And Hayes has the better 50 free and significantly better 100 free, which adds a lot more relay value. Here’s Hayes’ lifetime-best 100 fly (lane 5 with the blue cap) – he’s got awesome turns and a picture-perfect butterfly. There’s also valuable room for improvement, though. His underwater kicks seem to lose steam and there’s a little drop in intensity between his kickout and his breakout stroke. The 200 fly is the same (blue cap, lane 4) – he went straight from 1:47 to 1:41 in a single day, and he’s going to have plenty more time to drop with experience and polishing in that race. And just for fun, here’s his 50 free (blue cap, lane 5), where you get a better picture of how good his underwaters are, and where he does a better job transitioning between his dolphin kicks and his breakout stroke.

2.Anthony Grimm (Previous Rank: #1) – Mason Makos Swim Team – Oakton High School – Fairfax, VA **Verbally committed to Texas**
Best Times: 100 back – 45.60, 100 breast – 52.51, 50 free – 19.67, 100 fly – 47.40, 100 free – 46.59

Grimm is probably one of the best pure athletes we’ve ever seen in these rankings. He’s got unparalleled fast-twitch strength, high-level underwaters, and a crazy sprinting ability across all four strokes. Here’s his lifetime-best 100 back from last spring. (Grimm is in lane 4 in the white cap with no logo – you’ll know which one he is by the start alone). He’s got a brilliant backstroke start, and one big factor that you don’t see above is how good Grimm is in the 50 back. As a sophomore, he went 20.8 leading off a 200 medley relay. That would have been the 5th-fastest split in the entire NCAA meet a month later and gives him another avenue for relay impact early in his career. Grimm has two things working against him in this year’s ranks. He dealt with a back injury this year and missed some training, which led to a lack of time drops in his high school season. And based on his

By Braden Keith on SwimSwam

With very little in the way of live sports going on around the world right now, sporting networks are scrambling to produce any content that will engage or re-engage a thirsty audience.

For NBC Sports, that has included digging into their vaults to play re-broadcasts of old Olympic Games footage.

NBC has been the sole American broadcaster of the Summer Olympics since 1988, though they also telecasted the 1980 and 1964 Games in-and-among runs by ABC and CBS. The network now pushes the events across its full channel of networks, including the Olympic Channel, Bravo, USA, Oxygen, Telemundo, Telemundo Deportes, Golf Channel, CNBC, MSNBC, and NBC Sports Network.

That means thousands of hours of archived footage that many of us haven’t seen since they aired live.

The opening night of Olympic Games Week will begin on Monday at 7 Eastern Time with a Best of Team USA segment that will feature the top athletes from the 2016 Rio Games, including swimmers Michael Phelps, Katie Ledecky, Simone Manuel, and Ryan Lochte. The event will run for 2 weeks until April 27th.

The week-long coverage will focus on sports where American teams have excelled (NBC Sports does, after all, reach a primarily American audience) including gymnastics, basketball, women’s soccer, track & field, beach volleyball, diving, water polo, and swimming.

The schedule will include an all-aquatics day on April 17th (Friday), with diving, water polo, and swimming.

NBCSN Olympic Games Week TV Schedule – Aquatics Only

Shows that will be entirely, or in part, about aquatic sports.

Aquatics Only – different view

NBCSN Olympics Games Week TV Schedule

By Gold Medal Mel Stewart on SwimSwam

The 2020 Olympic Perspective Issue of SwimSwam Magazine is coming soon.

2020 Olympic Perspective Issue

The 2020 Olympic Perspective Issue is massive, 172 pages, coming in at nearly one pound. Olympic champion Caeleb Dressel  is our cover, the most dominant sprint star in the world.

Coronavirus has impacted Olympic history, postponing the biggest sporting event on earth, and the next issue of SwimSwam addresses this topic. We review all of the Olympic boycotts and cancellations, putting this moment into perspective. We also preview the Olympics as if they were happening this summer, and we project how swimmers will perform in 2021 with the extra year of training. This historic Olympic Perspective issue is large, 172 pages, with many more features. We hope you subscribe and appreciate the gravity of this moment in swimming history.

If you are not a subscriber, now is a great time to sign up. Start with the Caeleb Dressel cover, and stay with us through 2021 Spring Issue.

With your yearly subscription, you receive over 600 of pages of swimming’s highest quality content, and another 2,852+ pages of digital issues, going back to the first issue produced.

With your subscription today you get the:

• 2015 Year in Review (Michael Phelps cover) as a digital magazine (print is sold out)
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• 2017 College Preview Issue (Simone Manuel cover) as a digital magazine(print is sold out)
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• 2019 World Championships Preview (Michael Andrew cover) as a digital magazine
• 2019 College Preview (Beata Nelson Cover) as a digital magazine
• 2019 Year In Review (ReganSmith cover) as a digital magazine
• 2020 Swimsuit Issue  (Adam Peaty cover) as a digital magazine
• 2020 Olympic Perspective Issue as a print magazine (Caeleb Dressel cover)
• 2020 College Preview Issue as a print magazine
• 2020 Year In Review as a print magazine
• 2021 Spring Issue as a print magazine

_{Already a subscriber? Go to swimswam.com/magazine/digital-access, type in your email/password and view the digital magazines.}

See seven reasons to love SwimSwam Magazine for our upcoming issues. 

ONE

You want the Caeleb Dressel cover. We memorialized swim stars with beautiful covers you have to hold  in your hands to appreciate.

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All issues have a big theme, one topic we cover in-depth.  The 2018 Year in Review was all about The Year of the Pro. The 2017 Swimsuit magazine was the Superhero issue, and the 2020 Olympic Perspective issue is all about the history of the Olympics during the event’s most challenging times.

THREE

If you subscribe, you can also buy back issues.  On the subscription page, check the box by any of the back issues to add them to your order. *Note, several of  issues have sold out.Going forward we will not print additional runs. Once an issue is sold out, it is gone and only available on our digital platform.  Printed back issues are limited to what is in stock.

Many print back issues are sold out. Once a print issue sells out, it is gone forever (other than on our paid digital platform).  If the print issue is not on the BACK ISSUE checkout page, it is gone. 

FOUR

Magazines are massive. The 2016 Olympic Year in Review came in at 172 pages. The 2019 Swimsuit Issue is 196 pages. SwimSwam magazines come in at nearly a pound.  We deliver big issues. Period.

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The quality is high. SwimSwam Magazine has perfect binding (like a book), heavy card stock, and an expensive cover finish. If you haven’t subscribed, you simply don’t know. You feel it the instant you touch the magazine. The texture is amazing, and you’ll love how heavy it feels in your hands.

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SwimSwam Magazine named one of the 30 Hottest Launches of 2016

Competitive Intelligence of Media Leaders (MIN/Mr. Magazine) named SwimSwam Magazine one of the 30 Hottest Launches. Criteria for making the 30 Hottest list included:

• Design
• Creativity
• Audience reaction
• Industry reaction

OUR MAGAZINE MISSION

To knock you over with each issue, producing a must-have magazine that feels like a collector’s item.

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At SwimSwam, we love the sport, and we love changing the paradigm of how it’s presented. For far too long swimming magazines have been the same, and it is our goal to deliver something spectacular, a magazine you will be excited about getting every single time a new issue is released.

Subscribe to SWIMSWAM MAGAZINE here.

Read the full story on SwimSwam: How to Get The Olympic Perspective Issue With The Caeleb Dressel Gold Cover

By Braden Keith on SwimSwam

Fitter and Faster Swim Camps is the proud sponsor of SwimSwam’s College Recruiting Channel and all commitment news. For many, swimming in college is a lifelong dream that is pursued with dedication and determination. Fitter and Faster is proud to honor these athletes and those who supported them on their journey.

High school senior Stephen Speck has given a late boost to the incoming Florida State men’s recruiting class, committing to the Seminoles as a member of the high school class of 2020. Speck is a Florida native who attends Gulf Breeze High School and trains with the Greater Pensacola Aquatic Club in the Panhandle region.

I am very excited to announce my verbal commitment to swim and study at Florida State University! I would like to thank my family, friends, and coaches for helping me get to where I am today. I would also like to thank the coaches at FSU for giving me this once in a lifetime opportunity. Go Noles!!!

Speck’s patience in waiting until the end of his senior year to make a college decision paid off big-time with huge time drops in several events, highlighted in the table below:

While many of these events won’t wind up being primary races for him, his general improvements across-the-board are highlighted above by the 200 back (2.68-second improvement), 200 fly (12.35-second improvement), and 400 IM (19.11-second improvement). Three races that previously weren’t really on his radar are now among his best swims. It took 3:54-mid to score last season in the 400 IM at the ACC Championships, so Speck is already within 4 seconds of that time. For the sprint-heavy Seminoles, that 400 IM was their worst race at last year’s ACC Championship meet, scoring only 6 points, so any contribution Speck can make there will be welcome.

He joins a big incoming Florida State men’s class that includes David Quirie, Elvis Kotikovski, Mason Herbet, Rush Clark, Tommy Eaton, Yordan Yanchev, and Zach Smith.

If you have a commitment to report, please send an email with a photo (landscape, or horizontal, looks best) and a quote to Recruits@swimswam.com.

About the Fitter and Faster Swim Tour 

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Read the full story on SwimSwam: Stephen Speck Commits to Florida State after 400 IM Breakout

By Keaton Burke on SwimSwam

Théo Bussière, one of France’s top breaststroke swimmers, spoke on the one-year postponement in an interview with the French Federation of Swimming. The 25-year-old has been struggling with injuries the past couple of years. With the COVID-19 pandemic and a national shelter in place in France, he is using this time to still heal and get his mind right for the now 2021 Olympic games.

“It leaves time to try to resolve this crisis, even if we do not know how we are going to get out of it all for the moment,” said Bussière, talking about the pandemic impact on the Olympics.

Bussière is unable to train at this time, but he relates to this situation as to how he dealt with his injuries.

“I think the injuries help me put things into perspective during this period. I manage to live it really well. This time, we are all in the same situation. Everyone is trying to do their best to minimize the negative impacts of stopping activity.”

Bussière’s top time came with his performance at the 2018 French Nationals Saint-Raphael with a 59.46 in the 100-meter breaststroke. He was just 23 at the time. The following year he struggled with injuries and missed the qualification standard for the 2019 Gwangju World Championships. He swam instead the 100 breaststroke at the 2019 U.S. National Championships in a time of 1:00.08 and ended up taking 4th.

The French swimmer discussed missing competition and how he felt as if he was trying to do too much in his recent races.

“In some aspects, I progressed, on others I had a little trouble getting back to my previous level. But what I remember from my year 2019 is that the best learning is competition. I feel like I haven’t had enough,” said Bussière.

Fellow countryman, Mehdy Metella, was originally planning to be out following his shoulder surgery at the beginning of 2020. The sprinter broke the French national record in the long course 100m butterfly in April of 2019, setting the new mark at 50.85. That made Metella as the 15th fastest performer all-time entering the Olympic year. Bussiere touched on his return for 2021 and the legs for their 4 X 100 medley relay.

“We all thought of Mehdy when we heard this news. He will be able to aim for Olympic qualification, hoping that he will return to his best level,” said Bussière.

In 2016, Bussière swam the preliminaries for a 4 X 100 medley French team that failed to make the finals at the Rio Olympics. With that being said, we can look ahead to the possible medley quartet at next year’s games, something that is touched on in the interview.

Bussière was a full second ahead of all other French swimmers with that 1:00.08 in the 100m breaststroke last year. Antoine Viquerat was the second fastest with a 1:01.08.

Metella returning from injury will make him a strong option for either swimming freestyle or butterfly on the relay. With Jérémy Stravius retiring, the next fastest flyers behind Metella are two seconds slower. Nans Roch has the closest time with a 52.87.

Yohann Ndoye Brouard (53.80) and Mewen Tomac (54.17) are the two top French backstrokers from the past year. Swimmers Clément Mignon (48.20), Maxime Grousset (48.56), and Florent Manadou (48.67) are potential relay candidates for the freestyle leg. Mignon split a 47.87 on the 4 X 100 Free relay in 2016.

The full interview with Théo Bussière can be found here.

Read the full story on SwimSwam: French Swimmer Théo Bussière Finds Positivity In Olympic Postponement

The NBCSN Olympics TV schedule will air nearly 100 hours of classic Olympic programming nightly f...

By SwimSwam on SwimSwam

By Avery Fornaciari

I’ll never forget the feeling of finding out my season was over.

My teammates Leo Laporte and Andrew Buehler, as well as our three coaches Tim Quill, CJ Moran, and Stephen Etienne had all traveled to Ohio to compete at the 2020 NCAA Division II Swimming and Diving Championships. It was a competition that we had trained all year for. Andrew had just competed the day before, qualifying for the meet in a grueling preliminary process, and Leo and I had just swam the 100 Yard Butterfly in the Thursday morning prelims. Leo had an extremely exciting swim that qualified him for finals and was also a personal-best time. Although I did not make finals, I was proud of posting a personal-best time and was extremely excited for the following day to compete in my favorite event – and the one that qualified me for NCAA’s – the 200 Yard Butterfly.

Our energy was high after prelims when we headed back to the hotel to rest for that evening’s finals. A few hours before we were scheduled to leave, our coaches came to our rooms with the terrible news that the meet had been canceled due to the coronavirus.

We all sat in a circle together and just grieved the loss.

If you haven’t competed in a sport that you have been truly passionate about for your whole life, this sense of loss may not make sense. To us, it felt like a part of our hearts were ripped out. We felt extremely confused and robbed of our hard work, and were left feeling incomplete. I mourned for my last chance as a senior on the team. I mourned for the feeling of never knowing what I was capable of. It was the type of pain that is very hard to explain in words, but I know my teammates, coaches, and I will always remember it. My heart hurts for all of the athletes at that meet, and for every athlete that lost their opportunity, no matter the sport, no matter the country. My heart hurt for all the parents that came to watch their children, who just the day before were told that spectators were no longer allowed to stay in an attempt to lower crowds. Our own alumni, and swimming legend, Ben Michaelson came all the way from Texas to support us and was unable to watch.

It has taken me some time to really be able to reflect on these events without feeling anger and sadness. It wasn’t the NCAA’s fault this happened. It wasn’t really anyone’s fault. Everyone has simply been trying to stop the Coronavirus from spreading. It is horrible that so many lost the goals and dreams that they were striving for, but as time goes on we must accept it as the best decision to ensure the health and safety of us all. It is important to understand these shut-downs had to happen to save thousands of lives around the world. We have all had to make some sacrifices, and this is just one of them.

With that being said, I think it’s really important to remind everyone to continue social distancing and sanitizing. We can do this together… but apart! Although, seniors may always feel something is missing, it is so important to remember everything that we DID accomplish. Our sports have given us more than just competition, they have given us love, happiness, teammates, and memories.

I always dreamed of what I was going to say at the end of my swimming career, and writing this now has given me that chance to actually have it be heard. Originally, I wanted to emphasize the importance of believing in your team and yourself, and the power of mindset in achieving your goals. Although these values still hold true, this experience has enlightened me to a new piece of advice. In life, we all tend to be so busy that we forget to cherish the little things. I mentioned to my team already, that it can be difficult to feel like you love swimming and diving every day. Sometimes you don’t want to get out of bed, or the thought of another double makes you want to cry. That. Is. Ok. You can push through anything, and you wouldn’t be where you are if you weren’t talented and didn’t love the sport. However, when you feel like that, it’s easy to forget why you love it, and you forget to cherish every second of it.

I hope that your season never ends the way many athletes had theirs end this season but one day it will end and you’ll miss it more than you expected. You’ll miss the early weight lifting sessions, the high fives from your teammates after a tough set, the smile on your coaches faces when the team wins a meet, and the feeling of hitting the wall after all your hard work paid off. My advice is to cherish it and make memories. Collegiate sports are such a short part of our lives, but they’re an incredibly beautiful part.

While I have the chance, I just want to thank so many individuals who have helped me throughout this journey. I could go on forever here, but I’ll try to keep it brief. Thank you to my teammates (old and new) who have become my family, and who have never failed to pick me up when I’m down, especially throughout all of this. To my coaches (old and new), who believed in me, who pushed me, and who never failed to show me what hard work, passion, and dedication can accomplish. To my siblings for cheering at every meet, and to my Mom for always being a ray of positivity. To my Papa for being my Dads companion on the rides up to New Haven and for always inspiring me to try my best. To my boyfriend Nathan for reminding me of my hard work every single time I didn’t believe in myself, I couldn’t have done it without him. Lastly, to my Dad who put me into this wild sport. Thank you, Dad, for driving me to 5 a.m. practices growing up, for traveling hours for my meets, for never disqualifying me when you officiated, and for supporting me through all the good and bad swims. Thank you to the SCSU Athletic Department, graduate assistants, and athletic trainers for all of your support towards our program.

Thank you everyone for taking the time to read this.

Avery Fornaciari finished her senior year in 2019-20 season with the Southern Connecticut State University Owls.

Read the full story on SwimSwam: I’ll Never Forget The Feeling Of Finding Out My Season Was Over

By Coleman Hodges on SwimSwam

While the world is taking mandatory time out of the water, we’ve been looking back at some really awesome races. And luckily, NBC, FINA, and other tele-providers have been helping us by putting up race videos from the vault. Todays comes from the 2007 Duel in the Pool, which was not only against Australia (later renditions were against the “European All-stars”) but was also long course.

It was the mixed 400 free relay (did not realize they had that event in 2007): the Aussies opted for the Female-Female-Male-Male Strategy, while the USA put 2 women in the middle and bookended with their males, the first of which was Michael Phelps. This put Phelps up against Libby Lenton. She didn’t do so bad, considering: Phelps split 48.72, while Lenton touched at 52.99, unofficially becoming the first woman under 53 in the 100 freestyle.

Splits:

Read the full story on SwimSwam: The Woman Who Went Head-to-Head with Michael Phelps in Open Competition

By Jared Anderson on SwimSwam

It’s that time of year again where we at SwimSwam rank out the top 20 high school swimming prospects in the upcoming NCAA recruiting class.

As college recruiting has reached earlier and earlier into high school classes, we’re continually expanding our recruiting ranks and coverage. Last spring, we ranked out the then-sophomore class. This is essentially a re-rank of that class, taking into account a year of improvements. Stay tuned to our recruiting channel for more additions to our yearly recruiting coverage:

• Boys & Girls ranks for current juniors – high school class of 2021 (updated rankings from our “Way Too Early” rankings last spring)
• Way Too Early ranks for current sophomore boys & girls – high school class of 2022
• Re-Rank of outgoing senior boys & girls – high school class of 2020

Further reading:

• Way Too Early NCAA Recruiting Ranks: High School Boys Class of 2021 (as ranked last spring)

So without further ado, let’s take a look at this class as a whole, then review our ranking methodology (please read it before you get upset about how low the top miler is ranked!) and get into our rankings.

2020 addendum: We anticipate the counterarguments already: ‘So-and-so missed their taper meet due to coronavirus!’ ‘These ranks will give an advantage to swimmers who had their high school seasons in the fall!’ ‘We can’t possibly know how fast so-and-so would have gone!’ The questions, of course, are valid. But the best we can do is take the information we have now and make our best ‘snapshot’ rankings. If we’ve made a tweak this year to account for coronavirus cancellations, it’s taking long course improvement curves a little bit more into account – if someone came up with big long course drops last summer or at U.S. Open, that’s potentially the most recent data point we have, and can help us identify fast risers. And trying to predict who was and wasn’t tapered isn’t a new phenomenon this year. With that in mind, the point of these rankings is discussion, and we’ve now got a whole new layer of analysis to discuss in the comment section this time around.

THIS CLASS

• A class incredibly tailored to the NCAA format – multi-stroke sprinters abound
• Very sprint-based class – 50/100 a lot stronger than 200
• Relatively light in distance swimmers at the top
• Great class for 200 IMers
• Tons of fast risers
• Not a terribly deep fly group
• A lot of big-time long course swimmers as well

Last year, we noted how good of a sprint class this was, and they’ve only gotten better. The top swimmers in the class in the 50 and 100 frees are the fastest juniors we’ve seen since Ryan Hoffer in the class of 2017. And what really makes this class stand out is how well swimmers transfer their speed between strokes. If we had to classify each swimmer in an event discipline, we’d probably consider three of our top four prospects as ‘general sprinters’ rather than confining them to one stroke or another.

On the flip side, this isn’t a great distance class. Every year, we seem to get at least one high school standout who is below 15 minutes in the mile – in fact, you have to go back to the Class of 2014 before you find a group without a miler under 15. That shortage in this class extends down to the 500 (where no one is under 4:20), and the 200 is slightly weaker than previous classes, relatively speaking.

Rather than 200 freestylers, though, this group is stacked with 200 IMers. It feels like every other recruit has a 1:47-or-better IM in their back pocket, often as a bonus event along with their main specialty. The IMs tend to show the most improvement from the high school level to the college level (consider that according to last year’s NISCA All-American lists, only five high schoolers of any grade broke 1:46 in the IM, while it took 1:43.0 just to score at 2019 NCAAs), so we’d expect this class to yield some eventual superstars. We may be entering an era where 1:39-or-better gets much, much more common at the NCAA meet.

This class is also rising extremely fast as a whole. Last year’s juniors were surprisingly hit-or-miss based on time changes from our sophomore ranks to our junior re-rank. But this class had a whole bunch of junior-year explosions, even with some athletes missing meets due to the coronavirus pandemic.

If there’s a stroke that gets short shrift here, it’s probably fly. There are a lot of versatile types that cross over into fly, but not many pure flyers in our ranks.

We’ve also got a good amount of big-name long course swimmers, though there aren’t as many of the great-at-long-course-but-only-OK-at-short-course types we usually see (and struggle hard to rank accurately).

**The 1000 free isn’t an event at the Division I NCAA Championships, but is swum instead of the 1650 in many Division I dual meets and is part of the NCAA program in Division II.

THE METHODOLOGY

Our goal in these rankings is to reflect what college coaches look for in recruits, based on many years of conversations and coverage.

We focus only on American-based athletes, simply because there is so much uncertainty with international recruits – if they’ll come to the states, when they’ll come to the states and with what graduating class they should be ranked. Projecting international recruits often becomes more a discussion of when they’ll first join a college program and not which program they’ll join.

A few other factors that weigh heavily in our rankings:

• Relay Value – Relay points count double in college swimming, and any program needs a strong stable of quality sprinters to fill out all 5 relays with studs. Obviously, a special distance swimmer can easily rank ahead of a very good 100 freestyler, but college swimming generally values a sprint freestyler over a distance swimmer, all other factors being equal.
• Improvements – Actual times are a the trump card, but any big improvements in quality can make a difference as well. For example, a swimmer who only took up year-round swimming as a junior in high school going the same time as a swimmer whose been swimming year-round since they were 8 will probably get the edge in our rankings. Think Breeja Larson.
• Short Course over Long Course – we recognize that some programs, many programs, put their focus with their high school aged swimmers on long course, especially depending on when the high school championships may fall. That said, college swimming is short course, so a swimmer who is great in short course but struggles in long course will have the advantage over the reverse.
• NCAA scoring ability – NCAAs are the big show for college teams, so we’ve weighted NCAA scoring potential very highly. Swimmers who already have NCAA scoring times wind up mostly filling out the top our of rankings. Since college athletic directors – and by extension coaches – also place high value on conference championships, scoring ability at conference meets is also a factor in our rankings.
• Relative depth in the NCAA and recruiting class – a wealth of elite depth nationwide in one stroke discipline makes a big difference in what times are considered more valuable in that event. Events rise at different rates in the NCAA, but when one event gets extremely deep and fast at the college level, it makes high school prospects in those events a little less valuable, relatively, with lots of other veteran options. In the same way, a recruiting class stacked with swimmers in butterfly, for example, would make each butterflyer a little less sought-after in the market, with lots of other recruiting options able to provide similar production.

Of course, there’s no way to predict the future, and the most concrete data we have to go on are cold, hard times. These rankings in no way mean that all of these 20 swimmers will be NCAA standouts, and they certainly don’t mean that no swimmer left off this list will make big contributions at the NCAA level.

With that out of the way, let’s get to our rankings.

Disclaimer: there are a lot of high school seniors in the country, and no really good, complete, 100% accurate listing of them all. If you don’t see your favorite swimmer on the list, feel free to politely point them out in the comments. There’s a chance that we disagree with your assessment of their spot in the top 20, and so long as it’s done civilly, there’s no problem with differences of opinions. There’s also a chance that we’ve simply missed a no-brainer (we’ve taken every precaution to avoid that), and if that happens, we want to make sure we correct it.

TOP 20 SWIMMERS FROM THE CLASS OF 2021

1.Aiden Hayes (Previous Rank: #2) – Sooner Swim Club – Norman North High School – Norman, OK **Verbally committed to NC State**
Best Times: 100 fly – 46.01, 200 fly – 1:41.34, 50 free – 19.58, 100 back – 46.31, 100 free – 44.01

Hayes surges into our #1 rank, in large part because of monstrous improvements to his 200 fly. At this time last year, Hayes was a pure 50/100 type with a 46.6 100 fly but only 1:47 200 fly. He’s blown out both times, going to 46.0/1:41.3, and the latter of those times actually would have scored at 2019 NCAAs. A few factors bumped Hayes over Grimm for the time being. His top three events fit together very nicely in the NCAA format. The 200 fly development shows way more range than we thought he had a year ago. And Hayes has the better 50 free and significantly better 100 free, which adds a lot more relay value. Here’s Hayes’ lifetime-best 100 fly (lane 5 with the blue cap) – he’s got awesome turns and a picture-perfect butterfly. There’s also valuable room for improvement, though. His underwater kicks seem to lose steam and there’s a little drop in intensity between his kickout and his breakout stroke. The 200 fly is the same (blue cap, lane 4) – he went straight from 1:47 to 1:41 in a single day, and he’s going to have plenty more time to drop with experience and polishing in that race. And just for fun, here’s his 50 free (blue cap, lane 5), where you get a better picture of how good his underwaters are, and where he does a better job transitioning between his dolphin kicks and his breakout stroke.

2.Anthony Grimm (Previous Rank: #1) – Mason Makos Swim Team – Oakton High School – Fairfax, VA **Verbally committed to Texas**
Best Times: 100 back – 45.60, 100 breast – 52.51, 50 free – 19.67, 100 fly – 47.40, 100 free – 46.59

Grimm is probably one of the best pure athletes we’ve ever seen in these rankings. He’s got unparalleled fast-twitch strength, high-level underwaters, and a crazy sprinting ability across all four strokes. Here’s his lifetime-best 100 back from last spring. (Grimm is in lane 4 in the white cap with no logo – you’ll know which one he is by the start alone). He’s got a brilliant backstroke start, and one big factor that you don’t see above is how good Grimm is in the 50 back. As a sophomore, he went 20.8 leading off a 200 medley relay. That would have been the 5th-fastest split in the entire NCAA meet a month later and gives him another avenue for relay impact early in his career. Grimm has two things working against him in this year’s ranks. He dealt with a back injury this year and missed some training, which led to a lack of time drops in his high school season. And based on his

By Anne Lepesant on SwimSwam

Fitter and Faster Swim Camps is the proud sponsor of SwimSwam’s College Recruiting Channel and all commitment news. For many, swimming in college is a lifelong dream that is pursued with dedication and determination. Fitter and Faster is proud to honor these athletes and those who supported them on their journey.

Kendra Joachim, a senior at Lake Forest High School in Lake Forest, Illinois, has announced her commitment to the United States Air Force Academy’s class of 2024. She will join future classmates Allison Langenburg, Bella Ratzlaff, Brooke Costella, Madigan Starr, and Raquelle Roesch in the fall.

“I am super excited to announce that I will be continuing my academic and athletic career at the United States Air Force Academy! The opportunities at the Academy are unmatched, and I could not pass up the opportunity to serve my country while getting to swim and study at such an amazing institution. Thank you so much to my family, friends, and coaches that have helped me get to this point. Go Falcons!!”

Joachim competed at the 2019 Illinois High School State Championships last fall, placing 21st in the 200 free (1:54.23) and 29th in the 100 fly (57.65) in prelims. In club swimming, where she represents Scout Aquatics, she recently swam at Illinois Swimming LSC Senior Short Course Championships in the 100/200/500 free and 100 fly, coming in 12th in the 500. In LCM, nearly all of her best times date from the summer of 2018 and most of those come from Pleasant Prairie Sectionals.

Top SCY times:

• 100 fly – 56.36
• 100 free – 53.74
• 200 free – 1:51.92
• 500 free – 4:58.55
• 1650 free – 17:28.22

The Air Force women compete in the Mountain West Conference and placed 10th of ten teams at the 2020 conference meet. Joachim’s best times would have helped the Falcons by scoring in the 1650 (23rd), 500 free (C final), 200 free (C final), and 100 fly (C final). Future training partners will include butterflyer Dia Gawronski, a sophomore, and freestylers Gina Jenkins (freshman), Sefilina Maile (freshman), and Alicia Campbell (sophomore).

If you have a commitment to report, please send an email with a photo (landscape, or horizontal, looks best) and a quote to Recruits@swimswam.com.

About the Fitter and Faster Swim Tour 

Fitter & Faster Swim Camps feature the most innovative teaching platforms for competitive swimmers of all levels. Camps are produced year-round throughout the USA and Canada. All camps are led by elite swimmers and coaches. Visit fitterandfaster.com to find or request a swim camp near you.

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Facebook – @fitterandfastertour

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^{FFT is a SwimSwam partner.}

Read the full story on SwimSwam: Free/Fly Specialist Kendra Joachim Commits to Air Force Academy

By Adrian Mancebo on SwimSwam

Arena es partner de SwimSwam

La campeona del Mundo y de Europa en 400m estilos (Budapest 2019) en categoría junior, Alba Vázquez, se suma al equipo de nadadores esponsorizados por arena en España.

Alba Vázquez, by arena

Alba Vázquez es una de las grandes promesas del deporte español. El pasado 2019, la onubense con tan solo 17 años sorprendió a todos convirtiéndose en campeona del Mundo y de Europa mientras establecía un nuevo récord del Mundo categoría Junior en la prueba de los 400 metros estilos (4.38.53), completando su captura de medallas con el segundo puesto en los 200 metros estilos (2.13.43).

A pesar de las circunstancias excepcionales de esta temporada 2020, la marca deportiva especializada en natación arena, continúa dando su apoyo a los deportistas que componen su equipo para ayudarlos y acompañarlos en el desarrollo de sus carreras deportivas y en el camino hacia la consecución de sus grandes objetivos.

Arena y Alba acaban de firmar un acuerdo en el que ambas partes irán de la mano las dos próximas temporadas con un bonito sueño común, el debut de la onubense en la cita de Tokio.

“Estamos muy contentos de tener a Alba dentro de nuestro equipo, es una joven muy trabajadora y con gran capacidad de crecimiento. Para arena es importante acompañar a sus nadadores desde el comienzo y poder ayudarles a conseguir sus sueños es una de nuestras razones de ser”. Afirma Icíar Tarascón Marketing Manager de arena España.

Con respecto al acuerdo con arena, Alba afirma que “el respaldo de una gran marca como arena supone todo un paso hacia delante. No solo es un orgullo saber que confían en mi, sino que además poder contar con su material deportivo puede ayudarme a mejorar más fácilmente”.

En estos momentos Alba, como tantos deportistas, se encuentra en casa adaptándose a la nueva situación, como la mayoría de estos deportistas lo afronta con mucho optimismo y esperando una rápida respuesta por parte de toda la sociedad para volver a la normalidad lo antes posible, ya que a pesar de su juventud ya sabe que con trabajo constante y en equipo es mucho más sencillo lograr nuestras metas.

Desde su creación en 1973 arena ha estado ligada al mundo del deporte, patrocinando actividades de distintos niveles, y ahora es el turno de Alba Vázquez, una nadadora que está plantando las semillas para el que se plantea como un futuro prometedor.

Sobre arena

Desde 1973, arena ha creado productos de baño dirigidos a deportistas y nadadores profesionales de todo el mundo, y de esta forma se ha convertido en una de las marcas de referencia internacional gracias a la calidad de las prendas de baño y su equipamiento. En los últimos 45 años, arena se ha convertido en un experto en crear productos de baño de alta gama, así como complementos y ropa de playa. Actualmente está presente en 116 países a lo largo de todo el mundo. Con representación en Italia, Francia, Alemania, el grupo cuenta con una red de 35 socios en más de 100 países. arena siempre ha estado ligado el mundo del deporte, la natación en particular patrocinando actividades de distintos niveles, federaciones nacionales, atletas y clubes. arena patrocina 57 atletas y 29 federaciones nacionales, incluyendo la Federación Estadounidense de Natación, así como programas de natación de la Divisón I de la NCAA para Stanford, la Universidad de Texas (Mujeres), Auburn, Universidad Estatal de Carolina del Norte y la Universidad de Virginia.

Read the full story on SwimSwam: Alba Vázquez, la nueva y prometedora incorporación de arena