Brendan Whitfield Swims 42.67 100 Free, Wins 4th Indiv. Event On Day 5 Of YMCA Nationals

2023 YMCA NATIONALS (SC)

• April 2-7, 2023
• Greensboro Aquatic Center, Greensboro, NC
• SCY (25 yards)
• Meet Central
• Live Stream
• Psych Sheet
• Live Results
• Day 1 Recap
• Day 2 Prelims Recap | Day 2 Finals Recap
• Day 3 Prelims Recap | Day 3 Finals Recap
• Day 4 Prelims Recap | Day 4 Finals Recap
• Day 5 Prelims Recap

On the final day of the 2023 YMCA short course national championships, the 1650 free, 200 fly, 100 free, and 100 breast were contested. Once again winning an event was 2023 Virginia Tech commit Brendan Whitfield, who clocked a 42.67 to win the 100 free and dropped 0.1 of a second off his previous best time set this February. He also broke Jack Alexy‘s meet record of 43.07, which was set in 2019.

This race marked Whitfield’s fourth individual win at this meet, as he had previously won the 100 fly, 200 free, and 50 free. He has shown tremendous progress over the last year in this event, as at 2022 YNats he had finished second with a 43.80. In the class of 2023, he now ranks second in the 100 free behind Hudson Williams (42.54).

Roman Jones and Daniel Diehl finished second and third with times of 43.26 and 43.53 respectively as the only other two sub-44 swimmers in the field.

Winning the girls’ 100 free was 2023 Texas commit Alexa Fulton, who swam a 48.98 and was the only swimmer in the field under 49 seconds. Her best time in the event is a 48.69 from 2022 winter juniors. Fulton’s future teammate Angie Coe won the 100 breast by over a second with a 1:00.22, improving a significant amount from her pre-meet PB of 1:01.25. Coe also took down Meghan Small‘s championship record from 2016 by 0.02 seconds.

200 breast champ and 2023 Michigan commit Ethan Schwab took the boys; 100 breast by 0.35 seconds in a time of 54.40, swimming 0.05 seconds than he did in prelims.

The youngest winner from tonight was 15-year-old Micah Davis, who dominated the 200 fly and won in a time of 1:46.38–over a second faster than the second-place finisher. He also dropped over a second from his own personal best, which was a 1:47.63 that was set this March. Davis is now ranked #41st all-time in the 15-16 U.S. boys’ age group for the 200 fly.

Leah Shackley took home her fourth event win of the meet in the 200 fly, as she swam a 1:54.63 to win by nearly two seconds. This swim was only her fourth time ever swimming the event, and she saw near-eight second improvement from her pre-meet best of 2:02.34. Her time from tonight would have also made the ‘B’ final at the 2023 NCAA Championships.

Winning the boys’ 1650 was 2023 Wisconsin commit Issac Fleig, who swam a 15:13.45 to win by over 20 seconds. The girls’ winner for the 1650 free was 2023 Arizona commit Ava Sutphin, who went a 16:34.74 and dropped exactly a second off her previous PB.

To close out the night, Schroeder YMCA’s Anne Dickinson (51.21), Lucy Art (50.51), Alana Berlin (49.80), and Tori Brostowitz(50.29) won the girls’ 400 free relay in a time of 3:21.81, while Garrett Gould (43.88), Rob Alexy (43.57), Riqui Iturbe Cosano (46.40), and Kenneth Barnicle (45.22) took the boys’ relay in 2:59.07.