2022 US PARA SWIMMING NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS
- December 16-18, 2022
- Mecklenburg County Aquatics Center, Charlotte, North Carolina
- 50 meter (long course meters)
- Psych Sheets
- WPS Points Calculator (2022)
- Livestream: on the US Para Swimming Facebook page here
- Day 1 Results (PDF)
- Day 2 Results (PDF)
- Day 3 Results (PDF)
More big inter-class showdowns wrapped up the final day of competition at the 2022 US Para Swimming National Championships, though no more American Records fell after two were broken on Saturday.
Among the best on the day was a battle between Olivia Chambers (SM13) and Elizabeth Marks (SM6) in the women’s 200 IM.
Chambers scored 931 points with a 2:29.18 and Marks scored 926 points with a 3:03.28. While multi-class racing doesn’t always make it obvious when races are close, the 5-point gap between the two equates to about a half-second gap.
This year’s meet will be swum as a multi-class event. This means that swimmers from all classes will race each other, but rather than being compared on time, they will be scored based on the World Para Swimming points system. In short: the event winners will be the swimmers who come closest to the best times for their class since 2009 wins.
Classes S1-S10 are for athletes with physical disabilities, Classes S11-S13 are for athletes with visual impairments, and Class S14 is for athletes with intellectual disabilities. The system is designed so that swimmers with higher numbers generally have less-severe disabilities as they relate to swimming. The “SB” classification is for breaststroke events and the “SM” classification is for individual medley events.
Read more about the para-swimming classification system here.
That gives Chambers a second win of the meet, both coming ahead of Paralympic gold medalists – she beat-out McKenzie Coan by 3 points in the 400 free on Friday (again, about half-a-second).
That puts her in a group with Marks, Christie Raleigh-Crossley, Lawrence Sapp, and Trevor Lukacsko as double-winners at the meet. Of those, only Chambers and Lukacsko got wins on the last day – with the latter actually getting both of his wins on Sunday to close the meet.
The New Jersey native Lukacsko (S14/SM14) started his day with a 799-point swim in the men’s 200 IM, beating-out David Gelfand (SM9), among others. Gelfand was 2nd in 2:28.59, which was good for 787 points.
Later in the day, Lukacsko won the 200 free in 2:13.52, which was worth 709 points.
McKenzie Coan (S7), a four-time Paralympic gold medalist and one of the biggest names in attendance at this meet, wrapped her meet with her first title of the weekend. Coan won the 100 free in 1:12.64, which was a 917 point swim. That was one of three 900+ point swims on the final day of competition alongside the aforementioned 200 IM battle between Chambers and Marks.
That time is about two seconds behind the swim that won Coan a silver medal at the Tokyo Paralympics.
Other Day 3 Winners:
- Yaseen El-Demerdash (S10) won the men’s 100 free in 56.41 (857 points). That’s just .02 seconds away from his lifetime best. El-Demerdash is an American Record holder in breaststroke and butterfly races.
- Piper Sadowski (S14) won the women’s 200 freestyle in 2:30.57, a 693-point swim. The entire final for that race was made up of S14s, which made the final outcome for the race more evident. Sadowski, who lives in Western Michigan, is only 17-years-old.
