2024 AUSTRALIAN SHORT COURSE CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Thursday, September 26th – Sunday, September 29th
- SA Aquatic & Leisure Centre
- SCM (25m)
- Meet Central
- SwimSwam Preview
- Swimming Australia SC Worlds Qualification Procedures
- Start List
- Day 1 Recap/Day 2 Recap
- Live Results
Tonight saw another thrilling session of action unfold at the 2024 Australian Short Course Championships.
Grayson Bell got the speed going in the men’s 50m breaststroke, establishing a new national record of 26.02 en route to gold. That improved upon his 26.11 put up during the heats to claim the top seed.
On his performance, 27-year-old Bell pointed to his current training environment as motivation, which involves coach Tim Lane and Olympic champion Cameron McEvoy.
“Tonight has given me so much confidence … and my new training with Tim (Lane) and Cam McEvoy has really lifted me.
“I love training with them and after doing two personal bests in one day, has blown my mind and my confidence levels.
“It was a hard setback missing the Paris team. It was tough seeing everyone go away, and I wanted to be part of that but knowing there was another big competition in the calendar, I had a goal and a target set, so along with the help of my support staff, who really boosted me, I had to keep going and to target this next big competition.
“I owe a lot to Cam and Tim … Cam has also been like a mentor to me. When I started approaching him last year, he was very open minded and thoughtful and gave me a lot of tips, and I’m super grateful for all the help is giving me.”
17-year-old Milla Jansen powered her way to a new Australian Age Group record of 52.31 in the women’s 100m free. The teen’s performance overtook Olympic champion Emma McKeon‘s former record of 52.41 that’s been on the books since 2011.
Jansen’s performance was good enough to make the grade for this year’s Short Course World Championships, her first senior team.
Jansen stated, “I only had a day or two off from Junior Pan Pacs, which was a pretty good meet for me. I wanted to continue training, to try go for this, because I know some of the Olympians weren’t going to do it, and it’s a really good opportunity for me.
“To get on to the senior team is something that I’ve always wanted to do. I think a short course team is a very good start.”
While 19-year-old Edward Somerville hit a time of 46.84 to win the men’s 100m free, runner-up Jamie Jack was also impressive with a sub-47-second result of 46.91. Both men notched their names onto the provisional list of athletes for Budapest.
Post-race, Jack commented, “It’s all about experience for me, to hopefully go to Budapest and be on a team with some of the veterans who already qualified. To be around that sort of experience and those performances would provide real learnings and allow me to just become a better athlete.
“It’s been awesome working with Dean (Boxall) for the last two years, I’ve made really big shifts.”
Finally, the women’s 400m IM saw Tara Kinder produce a gold medal-worthy time of 4:29.78. That rendered her the champion ahead of Kayla Hardy‘s 4:31.77 and Jenna Forrester‘s 4:37.94.
Kinder already won the women’s 100m breaststroke here on day one as well.
Said Kinder, “For the 100m last night it was more of a first day for to me go in and be as chill as possible, warm up, get used to the pool and everything … but for tonight, I was super nervous, so maybe it wasn’t a no pressure thing.
“Maybe I just prepped perfectly for this race, I got some pretty big PBs I just can’t complain about. Last night (100m) was a second and a half from 12 months ago and then again tonight was 11 seconds from a few weeks ago at States.
“I hadn’t swum in two years, prior to last month. So obviously that’s motivation. There’s opportunity here, it’s definitely a year to make a senior team debut. That’s where the focus was going.”
