Courtesy: Stephen Thomas
Masters Swimming Australia will hold its 50th National Championships (SCM) starting Tuesday at the Brisbane Aquatic Centre (pool events April 28-May 2). The final number of entries stands just short of 800, and one of the highest attendances in MSA history.
Making good his comment in December to SwimSwam, the recently minted 50m world record-holder (LCM) and reigning Olympic and World champion Cameron McEvoy (31) will swim the 25m freestyle event on the third day of competition, with a seed time of 9.36 seconds (30-34 age group). The 25m events are not recognized by World Aquatics but the Australian Masters record for the age group stands at 10.78 seconds.
The 31-yo McEvoy made good his pledge to swim in a 200m freestyle relay (age 120-159) for the Brisbane-based club Barbarians with his friend Pedro Goidanich (41), and fellow Dolphins David Morgan (32) a 2016 Olympic bronze medalist and Grayson Bell (29), the current 50 breaststroke (SCM) Australian Open record holder. McEvoy is down to anchor the relay, so sadly we will not be in a position to see him post a time in the 50m which his has not swum individually since 2016.
David Morgan is entered to swim his signature events the 100m and 200m butterfly, while Grayson Bell is entered in the 25m breaststroke.
Among other past Aussie Dolphins entered to swim are Olympic medalists Adam Pine (50-54) and Scott Miller (50-54).
Pine is entered to race in the 50m freestyle and 25m butterfly. The 3-time Olympian, highlighted by gold and silver medals as a prelim swimmer in the 400m freestyle and medley at Sydney and a second medley relay silver in Beijing. He also has nine World Championship medals in the
He started his swimming career as a 17-year old as scholarship holder at the Australian Institute of Sport and remained a national team member from 1993 to 2009, one of the longest tenures on the Australian Swim Team. He also attended the University of Nebraska where he was NCAA champion in the 100m Butterfly. In 2023 Adam began as Director of Teams for Invictus Australia. Pine promotes the benefits of sport to help particularly younger veterans with the challenges they face as they transition from military to civilian life. Pine will participate in in a relay with the newly formed “Team Veteran” swimmers.
Scott Miller is slated to race just the 50m butterfly, as the fastest overall seed at 25.00s. However, his path to this meet is very different from Pine, yet both at one stage were training at the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra in the mid-90’s. Both swimmers competed at the 1995 Pan Pacific Championships in the USA. Miller took gold in the 100m and 200m butterfly with Pine the bronze in the 100m. At the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, Miller took the silver medal in the 100 butterfly along with a bronze in the medley relay. However, the butterfly final was controversial in that Russian Denis Pankratov dolphin-kicked 35m from the start setting up a lead which he held to the wall in a new world record. This caused a rule change to restrict underwater to 15m.
After Athens Miller’s swimming career never reached the same high level. First injury, then lack of motivation saw him miss selection in Sydney 2000. A number of drug charges over the following two decades saw him spend time in jail and was released in June 2024. Those that have seen him around the pool in recent months say he is looking fit, reformed and swimming well. Here is hoping Masters swimming can play a part in his life outside the pool.
All the details to the Championships can be found here.
The pool competition will also be streamed live from 8am-5pm Tuesday 28th April until Saturday 2nd May.
Cam swam a 9:32, and then 2 heats later jumped in again for a 9:26.
Not sure if the link will work, but Masters Swimming Australia has posted a video: https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1BHaJ9vSJG/
He was the fastest seed in heat 1, then he asked officials if he could race again. He was allocated a vacant lane 0 in the final heat 20 with the slowest swimmers. They were all thrilled they had “raced” an Olympic champion!
I saw the video of him swimming the 4x50free on his IG, does anyone know what he split?
I read 20.33, seems reasonable
I believe that’s correct, there was a problem with the results, his split has only 25m time.
Grayson Bell 21.65
Pedro Goidanich 23.87
David Morgan 22.37
Cameron Mcevoy 20.33
I watched this race from pool deck after warming up next to him. His turns are strong. Would love to see him smash sc 50 more regularly. Even better is seeing him apply himself to one thing really damn well and prove that there is such a long age pathway for greatness.
Maybe SC Champs later in the year! Great for Aussie Masters the vibe was crazy, before and after the race.
I showed my kids the footage of the men’s 100 fly final at the Atlanta Olympics and they both found Pankratov’s swim hilarious. Not so funny at the time though… it’s great to see that Miller is healthy and back in the pool, and best of luck to him in his Masters career.
I’m very confused by this quote: “McEvoy is down to anchor the relay, so sadly we will not be in a position to see him post a time in the 50m which his has not swum individually since 2016.”
Um, he’s the current 50m WR holder …
SCM
Think they mean a short course 50 free.
SCM 50 FR….
yes, he has raced LCM many times
He hasn’t swum the event shortcourse in ages. Hoping he will give it a blast at some stage though, surely could pick up the SCM WR too!
In my mind… why not race the individual 50FR SCM if you know you are in such rare form, and at what most would consider to be an advanced age in the sport?
I’d be taking any opportunity I could get in such circumstances.
Maybe he doesn’t want to put a number on it ? Perhaps he doesn’t want to confront himself timewise to an event he doesn’t train for
There will be an opportunity at SC Worlds in December if McEvoy’s up for the challenge.
Maybe he wants to just have fun?
Given how rigorously-documented his training is, I imagine he knows what he would go/has done a stand-up in training (he spoke about the work he’d have to do to get the SCM WR on Elvis Burrows’ podcast), so I think he’s there to have a laugh and push his 25 on!
Being a good sport so somebody else can win it.