2024 BUCS Championships: James Guy Tops 200 Free, 100 Fly Events

2024 BUCS LONG COURSE CHAMPIONSHIPS

The 2024 British Universities & Colleges (BUCS) Long Course Championships got underway today from Ponds Forge. Powerhouse Loughborough will try to repeat as team champion, with Edinburgh, Stirling and more attempting to make a dent in the repeat trophy winners’ depth.

Mixed in with point-earning student-athletes were ‘guest’ performers, who were able to dive in for the heat swims. Among them was 28-year-old Olympic medlaist James Guy who took on two events in Sheffield.

Guy put up the fastest time of the field in the men’s 200m free, touching in a result of 1:46.69. That set him apart from 2 other guest swimmers in brothers Joe Litchfield and Max Litchfield, the latter of which just returned from earning 400m IM silver at this year’s World Championships.

Younger brother Joe earned a mark of 1:48.08 while Max registered 1:48.36.

The fastest non-guest swimmer was Loughborough’s Felix Auboeck, also competing here right after Doha. Auboeck clocked 1:50.26 and will dive into lane 4 for tomorrow night’s final.

Guy’s other event was the 100m fly where he notched a time of 52.97. He owns the British national record in this race, courtesy of the 50.67 put up at the 2017 World Championships.

Olympian Abbie Wood was another non-point-scorer who competed on day one, racing in the women’s 200m free and 200m IM.

Wood produced the sole sub-2:00 time of the 2free heats field, hitting 1:58.85 in the heats. Landing lane 4 for tomorrow’s final was Jemima Hall of Bath who notched 2:02.51 while newly-minted 400m IM world champion Freya Colbert of Loughborough will be in the mix with a prelims time of 2:02.88.

As for the 2IM, Wood logged a mark of 2:12.82 to also put a good distance between her and the next-closest prelims swimmer.

Next in line was Katie Shanahan of Stirling who turned in time of 2:17.73.

In This Story

5
Leave a Reply

Subscribe
Notify of

5 Comments
newest
oldest most voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Ellie
2 months ago

Any chance you could report more on BUCs? Some really fast swims going on.. 53.3 in 100 Back last night would have placed 3rd at World Champs last week

Andrei Vorontsov
2 months ago

No need to run in front of the train. Finals 100 butterfly at BUCS Lewis Fraser 52.62, 1st, Joshua Gammon 52.75 – 2nd

Scuncan Dott V2
2 months ago

Finals session has already happened.

Jess
2 months ago

The finals were actually earlier on the same day. Notable splits were Angharad Evans 1:06.0 100 break split in the mixed medley relay and Ollie Morgan 53.3 in the 100 back!

Jonny
2 months ago

1.46.6 in february is a very solid time, specially since hes had 0 rest from what ive heard. JIMMY GUY IS BACK 🔥

About Retta Race

Retta Race

Former Masters swimmer and coach Loretta (Retta) thrives on a non-stop but productive schedule. Nowadays, that includes having just earned her MBA while working full-time in IT while owning French 75 Boutique while also providing swimming insight for BBC.

Read More »