2023 FUTURES — Sacramento
- July 26 to 29, 2023
- LCM (50m)
- North Natomas Aquatic Complex Sacramento, California
- Meet Central
- Results on Meet Mobile: “2023 Futures Championships – Sacramento”
The 2023 USA Futures Championships got underway across all five sites on Wednesday. This year, the Region 5 meet is being held in Sacramento, California, and is hosted by DART Swimming. Day 1’s lineup featured the 200 free, 100 breast, 200 fly, women’s 800 free, and men’s 1500 free.
The first finals session kicked off with the women’s 200 free. Tying for 1st place was a pair of 18-year-olds: North Coast Aquatics’ Kathryn Hazle and Team Rebel Aquatics’ Madeleine Hebert. The pair were separated by .02 at the 100 mark and finished with identical times of 2:01.20. Rounding out the top three was DART’s Ava Portello, who swam 2:03.36.
The men’s 200 free saw a pair of Sandpipers of Nevada take the top spots. Leading the way was 16-year-old Luke Ellis, who touched in 1:51.17, a new personal best by over two seconds. Behind Ellis in 2nd was his teammate Dillon Wright. The Virginia commit dropped three seconds to hit a new personal best time of 1:51.17. Finishing .06 behind in a time of 1:52.15 was Lakewood Aquatics’ Cameron Castro.
Mia Nappi of Corvallis Aquatics swam to the win in the 100 breast. Nappi’s time of 1:10..95 was a personal best by one and half seconds and was the only swim sub-1:11. Rounding out the podium in 2nd and 3rd place were Ellie Fitzgerald, 1:11.04, and Kelsey Wasikowski, 1:11.49.
Nabbing the win in the men’s 100 breaststroke was 25-year-old DART swimmer Tom Higdon. Not only does his time of 1:02.05 represent a new personal best, but it also dips under the 1:02.19 Olympic Trials cut. Just a tenth above that cut was Iolani Swim Club’s Jon Reiter, who touched in 2nd with a time of 1:02.29. Rounding out the top three was Sierra Marlins and SMU swimmer Eric McCormick who hit the wall in 1:02.35.
The women’s 200 fly saw Sandpiper Applejean Gwinn take the win in 2:14.62, a nearly two-and-a-half second-best time. Her previous best of 2:17.05 was set at the Fran Crippen Swim Meet of Champions back in April of this year. The race for second was won by Sage Miller in a time of 2:16.16, touching ahead of Kathryn Hazle’s 2:16.76.
While already under the OT cut time of 2:00.49, Arthur Balva of Palo Alto Stanford Aquatics swam to a massive personal best in the men’s 200 fly. His time of 1:57.72 would have placed him in the top 16 at Nationals. Placing 2nd in the event was Andrew Teh, who swam 2:00.97 to finish ahead of the 2:01.81 posted by James Cahill.
The penultimate event saw the fastest heat of the women’s 800 free contested. Showing off that Sandpiper distance-free training was the winner, Chloe Mudadu, whose time of 8:54.77 saw her dip under 9:00 for the first time. Also breaking the 9:00 barrier for the first time was runner-up Viviana Criscione, who touched in 8:58.73.
A trio of Sandpipers claimed the top of the podium in the men’s 1500 led by Joshua Brown. Brown had previously collected an Olympic Trials cut in this event by virtue of his altitude-adjusted time of 15:50.30. He crushed that time and the OT cut off 15:39.89 by swimming 15:26.81 to take the win by over 10 seconds. Finishing in 2nd and 3rd were teammates Gabriel Manteufel (15:40.26) and Santiago Gutierrez (15:43.89).
