Arena Pro Swim Series at Mesa
- Thursday, April 14 – Saturday, April 16, 2016
- Skyline Aquatic Center
- Mesa, Arizona (same as Pacific Daylight Time, GMT -7 hours)
- Prelims 9AM / Finals 5PM (12PM/8PM Eastern Daylight Time)
- Psych Sheet
- Live Stream
- Live Results
- Meet Central
- Friday Finals Program
Women’s 200 Meter Butterfly – Final
- FINA A: 2:09.33
- U.S. Olympic Trials: 2:14.99
With no scratches affecting the A and B finals of the 200 fly, everyone will be gunning for top seed Cammile Adams in tonight’s final. She comes in with a 1.4-second lead over the field after dominating the competition in the morning. Kelsi Worrell and Ella Eastin, whose exciting 1-2 NCAA final had the fans on their feet, will look to turn their SCY outcomes into LCM success, but they’ll have to beat Cassidy Bayer, Katinka Hosszu, and Maya DiRado, all of whom have the edge in long course format.
Men’s 200 Meter Butterfly – Final
- FINA A: 1:56.97
- U.S. Olympic Trials: 2:01.99
North Baltimore teammates and training partners Michael Phelps and Chase Kalisz will once again swim side-by-side in the final of the 200 fly. Phelps took a break from this event after the 2012 Olympic Games in London, but he posted the top time in the world last year with a stunning 1:52.94 in finals at U.S. Nationals, and set the world on notice that it was probable he would swim the event at Rio. Since August his best time has been 1:56.11 at Winter Nationals. Kalisz was 1:57.19 at Winter Nationals and 1:57.93 at Orlando last month; he is a fierce competitor over the second half of the race and has a lot of practice chasing Phelps. Pace Clark posted the morning’s fastest time; he finished third behind Phelps and Jack Conger at 2015 Summer Nationals with 1:56.84. Conger is sixth after the morning heats and will be in the mix as well.
Long Gutierrez qualified ninth but declined to swim in finals, so Mathias Oh moves into the B final. Andrew Gemmell of NCAP and Sean Grieshop of Nitro scratched the C final to concentrate on the 400 free later in the program, while David Jakl of Trojan Swim Club turned down the opportunity to swim in the D final to focus on the 50 free.
Women’s 50 Meter Freestyle – Final
- FINA A: 25.28
- U.S. Olympic Trials: 26.19
Rising spring star Abbey Weitzeil was a half-body length ahead of the field when she broke 25 in her morning swim, and is the favorite heading into the final. However, Dana Vollmer posted a lifetime-best 25.00 this morning and, if last night’s explosive 100 fly win is any indication of what she has in store for us tonight, Weitzeil will have a race on her hands. Simone Manuel pulled out of the 100 back B final to concentrate on this race; she is seeded third going into the final with 25.18. Worrell also scratched the 100 back; she will focus instead on the 200 fly – 50 free double.
Katie Meili opted out of the 50 free to concentrate on the 200 breast. That moved King Aquatic Club’s Chelsea Bailey into the C final and SMU’s Nina Rangelova (thanks to her swimoff victory) into the D.
Men’s 50 Meter Freestyle – Final
- FINA A: 22.27
- U.S. Olympic Trials: 23.29
A mere .24 separate the top qualifiers in the men’s 50 free, and tonight’s A final will feature the top three seeds in the event, Nathan Adrian, Anthony Ervin, and Cullen Jones, in the middle lanes of the pool. Also within striking distance of a win are Erik Risolvato, Nick Soedel, Luis Flores, Michael Chadwick and Derek Toomey.
The men’s 50 free final heats are more or less intact. Only a scratch from Uvis Kalnins, who qualified 22nd, opened up a spot in the C final. Swimoff winner Daniel Ramirez will thus ascend into the C final while Patrick Park will get a second swim in lane 8 of the D final.
Women’s 100 Meter Backstroke – Final
- FINA A: 1:00.25
- U.S. Olympic Trials: 1:03.39
All eyes are on Missy Franklin in tonight’s final. After a somewhat lackluster prelims swim, the Colorado Stars backstroker will be in lane 1 for the final. Franklin missed the A final in the 200 free last night but went after the B final with gusto. Top qualifiers Katinka Hosszu and Kirsty Coventry will be in the middle lanes; each went 1:00 in prelims. It’s worth noting that Franklin’s 1:02.38 morning swim is an outlier; she has been very consistently at or below 1:00 every time she has swum the event since September. Maya DiRado could surprise the front-runners in tonight’s final; she qualified third in 1:01.10, her best morning swim of the season.
Kelsi Worrell and Ally Howe both pulled out of the 100 back final. As mentioned earlier, Worrell is concentrating on the 200 fly and 50 free; Howe is the top seed in the B final of the 200 fly.
Men’s 100 Meter Backstroke – Final
- FINA A: 54.36
- U.S. Olympic Trials: 57.19
Like the 200 fly the men’s 100 back allowed everyone who wanted a second swim to come back tonight. The championship final will pit Ryan Lochte against David Plummer, currently the world’s number 2 100 backstroker thanks to a 52.51 he swam in Dubai in November. Arkady Vyatchanin and Eugene Godsoe, both who have been under 54 this year, are threats as well.
Women’s 200 Meter Breaststroke – Final
- FINA A: 2:26.94
- U.S. Olympic Trials: 2:34.99
The women’s 200 breast A final is a remarkably tight field; Molly Hannis and Ashley McGregor broke 2:29 this morning while the other six finalists were under 2:30: Emma Schoettmer, Hilda Luthersdottir, Melanie Margalis, Laura Sogar, Breeja Larson, and Haley Spencer.
Katie Meili turned down the opportunity to swim in the 50 free final in order to focus on this race. She will be in lane 4 of the B final.
Men’s 200 Meter Breaststroke – Final
- FINA A: 2:11.66
- U.S. Olympic Trials: 2:18.39
After Cody Miller scratched prelims, Nic Fink and Andrew Wilson became presumptive favorites, coming in with sub-2:10 seed times. It was NBAC’s Chase Kalisz who led the field in prelims, though; he was only 1.4 seconds off his seed time with 2:13.81, and qualified more than 1.4 second ahead of Fink (2:15.24) and Steven Stumph (2:15.43). Wilson made top-8 as well; he medaled in this event at Summer Nationals after surprising everyone with a 6-second drop in prelims.
Gunnar Bentz scratched the 200 breast allowing Corey Lau to move into the C final and Kile Aukerman into the D final.
Women’s 400 Meter Freestyle – Prelims
- FINA A: 4:09.08
- U.S. Olympic Trials: 4:17.99
Katie Ledecky will swim against the clock once again, having qualified 7 seconds ahead of her next-fastest competitors: Cierra Runge and Katinka Hosszu. Ledecky has been 3:59.54 this season, and she has been under 4:04 every time she has competed in the 400.
Also in the A final will be Runge’s NBAC training partners, Lotte Friis, Allison Schmitt, and Becca Mann, as well as Joanna Evans and Sarah Henry.
Men’s 400 Meter Freestyle – Prelims
- FINA A: 3:50.40
- U.S. Olympic Trials: 3:58.69
Open water Olympic qualifier Jordan Wilimovsky was the dominant figure in heats of the men’s 400 free, but Conor Dwyer, Michael McBroom, Clark Smith, Cristian Quintero, Ous Mellouli, Marcelo Acosta, and Matias Koski are each capable of winning the title. The men’s 400 free is shaping up to be as tight as the women’s 200 breast. Given the way Wilimovsky, Dwyer and McBroom finish, this is likely to be the race of the night.
