Wolverine men get big distance pickup with Wilton Y’s Stephen Holmquist

The Michigan Wolverines reloaded their distance corps this week, picking up a verbal commitment from former YMCA national champion Stephen Holmquist.

Holmquist comes from the YMCA powerhouse Wilton Y in Wilton, Connecticut. He’s a classic distance man who gets better as the distance goes up, and adds some solid 400 IM potential to boot.

Holmquist’s Top Times

  • 1650 free: 15:24.09
  • 500 free: 4:29.80
  • 200 free: 1:42.66
  • 400 IM: 3:54.03

On top of those times, Holmquist might have been even more impressive in long course, where he won a YMCA national title in 2013 (the 800 free) and holds a Connecticut state record in the 1500.

“I was impressed with the Distance Program at Michigan that Coach Bottom and Coach White have developed,” Holmquist told SwimSwam in an e-mail. “It is the best in the nation.”

No doubt a big draw for Holmquist was the work Michigan did with NCAA champ and Olympian Connor Jaeger, who graduated last spring as one of the top distance swimmers in NCAA history.

The Wolverines have won 4 straight Big Ten titles and are just one year removed from their NCAA championship season. Holmquist will join the program next fall. In addition to the team accolades, there was another pull for Holmquist to pick Michigan: family history.

“I am excited to follow in my Dad’s footsteps of swimming for the Wolverines,” Holmquist said of his father Peter, who competed for Michigan in the ’80s. “GO BLUE!”

6
Leave a Reply

Subscribe
Notify of

6 Comments
newest
oldest most voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Chris
9 years ago

WWMT

Anonymous
9 years ago

Definitely a great pickup on Michigan! Stephen will definitely do the job right at Michigan!! Hope to see you do well Stephen!!!

Zanna
9 years ago

Don’t they have Paul Powers?

calswimfan
Reply to  Zanna
9 years ago

yeah stop it Michigan_Fan. no more sprinters for you guys. Powers is a beast.

MICHIGAN_FAN
Reply to  calswimfan
9 years ago

Powers is a beast and Michigan is lucky to have him. But it takes more than one to have great 200 and 400 Freestyle Relays. Cal had 5 guys swim the NCAAs in the 50 Free last year. Michigan had 1. When Michigan won NCAAs in 2013, they had 4 guys. Need to bring that number back up.

MICHIGAN_FAN
9 years ago

Great pickup! He will also be joining his former club teammate Ian Rainey, a freshman this year at Michigan who swims the same events.

Michigan now needs a top sprint freestyler to take over for senior Bruno Ortiz.

About Jared Anderson

Jared Anderson

Jared Anderson swam for nearly twenty years. Then, Jared Anderson stopped swimming and started writing about swimming. He's not sick of swimming yet. Swimming might be sick of him, though. Jared was a YMCA and high school swimmer in northern Minnesota, and spent his college years swimming breaststroke and occasionally pretending …

Read More »