2016 Blue-Chip Sprint Recruit Albert Gwo To Join Columbia

Former top-20 recruit in the class of 2016 Albert Gwo is set to join Columbia University after sitting out what would have been his freshman year in the NCAA.

Gwo originally committed to California back in the summer of 2015. But he never showed up on the Cal roster this past season with the rest of that high school class of 2016 recruiting class. Now CollegeSwimming.com reports on Twitter that Gwo has committed to Columbia:

Gwo was one of the only 19-second sprinters in his recruiting class, holding a 19.90 best time in the 50 free. His top times:

Gwo’s Top Times

  • 50 free: 19.90
  • 100 free: 44.05
  • 100 fly: 48.49

Those sprint freestyle times come from high school. Gwo did do some swimming at the club level this year while taking his gap year between high school and college. His lifetime-best in the 100 fly comes from this past February. He’s also recently been 20.0 in the 50 free and 44.4 in the 100 free.

Gwo will jump all the way across the country to compete for Columbia. He comes from Palo Alto Stanford Aquatics and Los Altos High School in California. His lifetime-bests would have placed him 3rd in the 50, 6th in the 100 free and 17th in the 100 fly at this year’s Ivy League Championships.

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PVK
7 years ago

Good for him. Found the best fit for him.

longseeker
Reply to  PVK
7 years ago

Well, we will miss him at Berkeley as he is from the SF Bay Area (Palo Alto), so we will have to go with the following returning 50/100 free swimmers coming back for next season: Michael Jensen, Matt Josa, Justin Lynch, Kyle Coan, Pawel Sendyk, Quah Wen Zhang. And incoming frosh Bryce Mefford and Ryan Hoffer. Should be OK

JJB
Reply to  longseeker
7 years ago

According to College Swimming Cal is getting three #1 swimmers- Hoffer, Daniel Carr,Mefford and the #9 ranked swimmer Sean Grieshop. Interesting that the other 6 in the top 10 are all going to separate schools. Thats an entirely interesting discussion by itself and how it relates to intra conference competition.

longseeker
Reply to  JJB
7 years ago

You are correct JJB about a discussion needed when you see Cal, Texas, USC and Stanford et al “load up” in the Men’s ratings and have you looked at Stanford’s Women’s recruiting these past couple of years? J don’t see how they can miss on 3 more straight NCAA titles.

USCnattychamps2017
7 years ago

Kek

Reid
7 years ago

He was enrolled at Cal but withdrew before the swim season started. Must’ve really hated it.

GOoD StUfF
Reply to  Reid
7 years ago

He came for one practice and left

Sarcastic
Reply to  GOoD StUfF
7 years ago

he couldn’t hang!

coachymccoachface
Reply to  Sarcastic
7 years ago

OOO are we speculating about things we don’t know about! Count me in!

Y choi
Reply to  Reid
7 years ago

Not sure why you’re being downvoted, you made a pretty objective observation

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 …

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