2019 BUCS LONG COURSE CHAMPIONSHIPS
- British Universities & Colleges Sport Championships (LCM)
- Friday, February 15th – Sunday, February 17th
- Ponds Forge, Sheffield
- Meet Central
- SwimSwam Preview
- Entries
- Day 1 Recap/Day 2 Recap
- Live Results
Commonwealth Games champion James Wilby completed his trifecta of breaststroke wins at the 2019 Brutish Universities & Colleges Championships, taking the 100m sprint this evening in Sheffield. He helped Loughborough take home its overall title with a total of 389 points.
Below are the top 5 squads, combined men’s and women’s:
| Team | Place | Points |
| Loughborough | 1 | 389 |
| Stirling | 2 | 299 |
| Edinburgh | 3 | 290 |
| Bath | 4 | 181 |
| ManchesterMetropolitan | 5 | 144 |
After winning the 50m in 27.45, the 200m in 2:09.71, Wilby wrangled up his 3rd BUCS Record of the meet by taking the 100m breast in 59.42. That, too, overtakes the previous BUCS Record of 59.61 that the 25-year-old Loughborough athlete threw down at the 2018 edition of the meet.
He holds a personal bet of 58.64 from last year’s European Championships and remains just the 2nd British man ever to dip under the 59-second threshold in the 100m breast event.
Wilby’s performance tonight narrowly beat the 59.43 he put up on the Gold Coast last year for silver in the event at the 2018 Commonwealth Games behind teammate and Olympic champion Adam Peaty. Now Wilby inserts himself above Peaty in the overall world rankings, coming in as #3 and relegating Peaty to #4 this season.
2018-2019 LCM MEN 100 BREAST
PEATY
56.88 *WR
| 2 | Ilya SHYMANOVICH | BLR | 58.29 | 03/24 |
| 3 | James WILBY | GBR | 58.46 | 07/22 |
| 4 | Yan ZIBEI | CHN | 58.63 | 07/22 |
| 5 | Yasuhiro KOSEKI | JPN | 58.89 | 07/21 |
Another Commonwealth Games champion was in the pool tonight in the form of Scottish maestro Duncan Scott. After logging a 48.25 stellar split as a member of University of Stirling’s gold medal-winning men’s 4x100m freestyle relay, the 21-year-old clinched the 200m fly victory this evening.
Touching in a modest 2:00.47, Scott was well off his own personal best of 1:56.60 from the Commonwealth Games, a mark that earned him a somewhat surprise bronze medal. But, Scott’s time tonight was enough to hold off a charging Plymouth swimmer in Tom Beeley, who came on strong on the back-half to threaten the gold in a very close 2:00.68.
Sarah Vasey, Imogen Clark and Katie Matts were all 3 in the running for breaststroke gold once again at this year’s BUCS, but it was Commonwealth Games gold medalist Vasey who got her hand on the wall first in tonight’s 100m breast. Vasey earned the top prize in 1:08.06, with last night’s 50m breast winner, Clark, taking silver in 1:08.39.
Manchester Met’s Matts rounded out the top 3 in 1:09.30.
French swimmer Marie Wattel, who represents Loughborough, doubled up on gold medals this evening, first taking the women’s 100m free in a new BUCS record. Last year Wattel took the win in 54.33, but tonight the 21-year-old shaved .11 off that mark to register a winning effort of 54.22. Her mark sits just outside the top 10 performances in the world this season.
Wattel’s next victim was the 50m fly, where she notched a time of 26.41 to beat the field. Anna Ntountounaki added hardware to her 100m fly gold from last night with a silver behind Wattel this evening in 26.50.
Last night’s 200m freestyle head-turner, Tom Dean of Bath, took the men’s 200m IM this evening in a mark of 2:00.25. He was able to surge ahead at the end and hit the wall ahead of Sheffield Hallum’s Max Litchfield. Litchfield settled for silver in 2:00.50.
Dean’s mark overtook the previous BUCS record set by the aforementioned Scott of 2:00.89 from last year.
Relay-wise, the Loughborough women were too tough to beat in the 4x100m medley, as the combination of Mollie Allen, Clark, Atkinson and Wattel punched a time of 4:07.15
Stirling topped the men’s relay, beating longtime dominator Loughborough. The foursome of Martyn Walton, Craig Benson, Scott McLay and Scott collected a winning effort of 3:38.59. Scott anchored in a swift 48.22, the only sub-50 second split of the entire field.
Additional Winners:
- Loughborough’s Charlotte Atkinson won the women’s 200m fly in 2:11.03.
- Edinburgh’s Jack Thorpe was the men’s 100m free winner in 50.06.
- The women’s 200m IM saw Abbie Wood come out on top in 2:14.69. She holds the BUCS record with her 2:13.84 winning effort from last year.
- Calum Bain took the men’s 50m fly in 24.40.
- Stirling’s Cassie Wild won again, this time in the 100m back in 1:01.44, while Luke Greenbank took the win for the men in 54.97.
Tom Dean was the star of the show for me, swimming over the top of Duncan Scott and Max Litchfield in the IMs. Plus a fantastic in season 200 free, big future ahead of this young lad.
GBs 4×200 team seems to be getting stronger and stronger, I predict a team of Scott, Dean, Guy and Jarvis will be very strong come Worlds
Wilby looked great throughout the meet. He tends to swim quite fast in season, but still, 59.4 is impressive.
Tom Dean’s had a very useful meet, with wins in both IMs and the 200 free. His freestyle looks really sharp, today he split 27.19 in the 200 IM to overturn a 1.3 sec deficit to Litchfield at the 150 mark. Not a bad scalp to get.
Scott, as he seems to do at these champs, swimming some interesting events: 400 IM and 400 free to go with the 200 fly. The speed seems to be there judging from his 100 free relay splits.
I really hope this can be the year Imogen Clark transfers her 50 speed into a good… Read more »
Scott split 62.2 in the Heats of the Stirling medley relay also… I’d love to see him give some of those races a real go, particularly 400Fr. He seems to swim to win?
Some really good swims tonight. Sarah Vasey returning to form in the 100 the most pleasing for me – Her 50 was great last year, but her 100 struggled a little. Hopefully we’ll see her back under 1.07 this year. Tom Dean is clutch. Wilby is the real deal, and with Ross swimming the best we’ve ever seen him over the winter, Peaty will have no room for error at nationals – Really think we may have three GB men under 59 this year.
Shame we didn’t see Ross there to!