Another Big Charlie Hutchison Drop in the 200 Free Reloads Britain’s Famed 800 Free Relay

2025 LEN U23 European Championships

• Thursday, June 26 – Saturday, June 28
• X-bionic® sphere Pool, Šamorín, Slovakia
• LCM (50m)
• Start Times – Local: Prelims – 9:30 am / Finals – 6:00 pm
• Start Times – EST: Prelims – 3:30 am / Finals – 12:00 pm
• Meet Central
• Psych Sheets
• Live Results
• Livestream (Pay-To-Watch)
• Recaps:
  • Prelims: Day 1 | Day 2
  • Finals: Day 1 | Day 2

The British 800 free relays have been on a historic run, winning the last two Olympic gold medals and several other major international championships in between.

As it always does, time is moving forward and portions of the quartet that swam in finals in both Tokyo and Paris are nearing the twilights of their career, especially James Guy and Duncan Scott – who were also on the 2016 silver medal winning relay.

Olympic final relay ages, Tokyo & Paris:

• James Guy – 29
• Tom Dean – 25
• Matthew Richards – 22
• Duncan Scott – 28

While recent results from both Guy and Scott indicate it’s not time to retire them yet (both swam 1:45.08 at Trials), sustaining this kind of run requires always one eye on the future – which is part of what has made the Brits so successful in this relay, the ability to rebuild with a new wave.

Enter Charlie Hutchison, who turned 23 on April 1. He finished 3rd on Thursday at the European U23 Championships in 1:46.84. That swim makes him the 13th-best British swimmer in history, and carries a nearly two-second improvement versus his best time coming into the season (1:48.79 at the 2024 Trials).

Besides the times explicitly, Hutchison has proven to be a good big-meet swimmer, repeatedly striking his best times at the biggest meets.

He’s actually older than the early bloomer Richards by 8 months, but Hutchison’s improvement curve into his 23rd year is on-track. Combined with 25-year-old Jack McMillan, who went a best time of 1:46.40 at British Trials in May, this gives the British squad some future pieces to play with in terms of filling out this relay for the 2028 Olympics and beyond.

Looking beyond Hutchison, there is other young talent that emerged at the British Trials in April. That includes Hutchison’s fellow Loughbourough trainee Tyler Melbourne-Smith, who swam 1:47.46 at British Trials – a modest tenth-of-a-second improvement over last season.

The list also Scottish swimmer Evan Jones, who swam a best time of 1:47.48 in April, which was an eight-tenths drop for him.

Along with a group of teenagers like Gabriel Shepherd (1:49.34 – 2008 born), Angelo Giani Contini (1:49.24 – 2006 born), Hayden Annan (1:50.06 – 2007 born), and Jacob Mills (1:50.08 – 2007 born), the coffers are full for British Swimming. The leap between a 1:49 and a 1:44 (or even a 1:46 and a 1:44) is large, but stacking up talent like this who, for the most part, are still dropping time like age groupers, gives British swimming brass a lot of opportunities to get it right in an event where the country has been really good at nailing that development.

British Rankings All-Time, Men’s 200 LCM Freestyle