Video produced by Chris Thompson
As reported by Braden Keith
The Texas men’s swimming & diving teams held their annual Class Relay Meets on Thursday, and the results were the most encouraging results yet this season for the defending NCAA Champions.
In the meet, which is one of many uniquely-formatted intrasquad meets (which are more like glorified full-speed practices) employed by Texas head coach Eddie Reese every season, the swimmers compete in a 200 medley relay and 200 free relay by class. That is to say, an all-star relay of freshmen compete against an all-star relay of sophomores, against one of juniors, against one of seniors, in each of two relays.
Last year’s meet saw some incredible splits from Townley Haas and Joseph Schooling, both of whom would go on to win multiple NCAA titles in individual events.
This year saw more fireworks from the pair, along with their teammates.
The best splits in each race, regardless of class:
200 medley
- Backstroke – John Shebat – 21.16
- Breaststroke – Will Licon – 23.64
- Butterfly – Joseph Schooling – 19.68
- Freestyle – Townley Haas – 18.70
- Aggregate – 1:23.18
200 free relay
- Flat start – Jack Conger – 19.41
- Relay start – Joseph Schooling – 18.87
- Relay start – John Shebat – 19.00
- Relay start – Townley Haas – 19.19
- Aggregate – 1:16.47
Among the highlights:
- The aggregate time of the medley relay was 1:23.18, which would’ve beaten all but 3 relays at NCAAs last year. Texas placed 3rd at NCAAs in 1:22.75 with the same 3 legs, except for the now-graduated John Murray. He split 19.15 in finals for the Longhorns – Haas split 18.70 on Thursday.
- While Schooling wasn’t quite as fast as he was in the 200 medley relay finals at NCAAs in 2016 (19.36), his split was better than prelims (19.72) and also faster than any other split at NCAAs from last season. After a rocky start to the season, Schooling’s performance on Thursday says he’s rounding into form just in time for championship season to start.
- Texas won the 200 free relay at NCAAs last year with Brett Ringgold, Schooling, Jack Conger, and Murray combining for a 1:14.88. On relative terms, their 1:16.47 on Thursday wasn’t as impressive as the medley relay aggregate, though it was on a relatively quick turnaround. Schooling’s 18.87 was the only sub-19 split on Thursday – he was 18.53 to lead the Longhorns at NCAAs last year as well.
- Jack Conger, Will Licon, and the seniors won the 200 medley relay, while the sophomores, including both Haas and Shebat, won the 200 free relay. Last season, the class that are now sophomores won both relays as freshmen.
Full splits and videos will be available shortly.
Watch Texas senior PJ Dunne hold of an 18.70 split from Townley Haas on the anchor for the win:
The old guys still have it. PJ Dunne holds off Townley Haas' 18.70 anchor (‼️) to give the Seniors a 200 MR win in class relays. pic.twitter.com/GdAVdxQxAq
— Texas Men'sSwimDive (@TexasMSD) February 1, 2017
Joseph Schooling going 19.68 doesn’t even seemed fast anymore considering what he went at NCAA’s last year. I wonder how fast he can be this year
The freshmen got hosed. The Texas wave is cresting.
Ummm, the reigning NCAA 200 and 500 Freestyle Champion just popped a 18.7 50 Free. The range of this guy!
Let’s do some more aggregate split analysis. Sure when you add up the 4 fastest splits you get 1:23.18, but they would go even faster if they had actually swum together. There’s actually a scientific phenomenon that occurs when the first 2 legs of a relay add up to be under 44.85. Shebat and licon would’ve put the relay at 44.80 going out. When this happens the water in their lane begins to exhibit rapid state changes by switching back and forth from liquid to gas almost instantaneously. This lowers the viscosity of the water in that lane. Given this effect, there is a minimum drop in time of .62 per 50 split. Townley and schooling would’ve been at least… Read more »
Is this true? Never heard of this before
100% made up.
This seems fake as hell
I heard they load up on beans pre meet. True story.
STATEment coming from them the boys at Carolina are gonna tear up the pool come July
23.64… is Will Licon hard? Sources claim he ain’t, but that split begs to differ
I can confirm that Will Licon ain’t hard.
Can we just take a second to admire the fact that 3/4 of those relays would’ve finaled (B-final that is, but still) at NCAA’s last year. In practice. Divided up by class year.
I’m not sure I’d count Texas out of the fight for a title just yet.
Wow… Decent split from Schooling if he had actually left on time. That’s a false start if I’ve ever seen one.
It looks very legal to me