UVA Cal Square Off In Non-Traditional Events Day After Fast Dual Meet

Virginia v. Cal (Saturday)

• Friday, October 15, 2021-Saturday October 16, 2021
• Spieker Aquatics Complex, Berkeley, CA
• SCY
• Dual Meet Format
• Results on Meet Mobile as “CAL vs UVA”
• Friday Women’s Recap
• Friday’s Men’s Recap
• Saturday’s Results

A day after putting up some pretty impressive (non-tech suited) times Friday evening, the Cal Bears and Virginia Cavaliers squared off again, this time option to forgo a traditional dual meet lineup in favor of some different events.

The action began with a 400 mixed medley relay. Mixed relays aren’t something we see in official NCAA competition, but have become more widespread at the international level, including at this summer’s Olympic Games. All 3 head coaches involved in the meet, Teri McKeever, Dave Durden, and Todd DeSorbo, were on the US Olympic staff over the summer, so they have some experience with making mixed medley lineups.

Cal opted to go with the Male-Male-Female-Female lineup, which tends to be the optimal lineup. Hugo Gonzalez led off in 46.87, followed by Reece Whitley (53.31), Izzy Ivey (53.55), and Elise Garcia (49.16), combining for a time of 3:21.89.

UVA tried to advantage of their relative strength on woman’s backstroke, and led off with Gretchen Walsh, who the night before went sub-52 in the individual 100 back. She wasn’t quite as fast Saturday, coming in just over 52 at 52.10. Noah Nichols split 54.43 on breast, followed by Max Edwards (48.09) and Kate Douglass (47.44), finishing just behind Cal at 3:22.06.

The meet closed out with a mixed 400 free relay, which UVA won by a decent margin. Alabama transfer Matt King led off in 44.39, followed by Matt Brownstead (44.09), Gretchen Walsh (48.53), and Douglass (48.89), for a total time of 3:05.90.

Cal’s crew of Bjorn Seeliger (44.33), Gonzalez (43.63), Ivey (49.77) and Garcia (49.53) combined for a time of 3:07.26.

There was plenty of individual swimming in between those two events, as swimmers participated in a biathlon and/or a stroke 50s skin race. The biathlon events consisted of two rounds of either the 300 free or two rounds of the 300 IM, with the winner of each version determined by total time.

Cal swept the freestyle biathlons. Ayla Spitz won the women’s free biathlon, going 2:50.89 and 2:49.71 in the two rounds to win by a wide margin with a combined time of 5:40.60. Gabriel Jett won the men’s free with times of 2:37.81 and 2:34.97. His combined time of 5:12.78 put him just ahead of UVA Jack Wright (5:13.03), who finished just behind Jett in each round.

UVA, however, swept the IM biathlons. Ella Nelson won in 6:13.49 (3:07.54/3:05.95) ahead of teammate (and Olympic 400 IM silver medalist) Emma Weyant‘s 6:16.83 (3:07.93/3:08.90). Casey Storch won for the men with a time of 5:40.72 after going 2:50.73 and 2:49.99.

The skins races of 50s were interspersed, by stroke, throughout the day, and while we don’t have full results (just the fastest overall time for each stroke), we do have the official list of winners, by stroke: