Budapest 2022: 4×100 Mixed Free Relay Analysis

2022 FINA WORLD AQUATICS CHAMPIONSHIPS

In the finals of the mixed 4×100 freestyle relay, the Australian team of Jack Cartwright, Kyle Chalmers, Madi Wilson, and Mollie O’Callaghan broke the world record in a time of 3:19.48. This came despite the team not having their best female freestylers from last year (Emma McKeon and Cate Campbell), which goes to show how strong the country is in the stroke. In this article, we take a look at the splits that swimmers produced on this relay.

Read more about Australia’s world record here.

Mens Leadoffs

Just like he did in the morning, Ryan Held got the United States off a strong start with a 47.93 leadoff, the only man under 48 seconds on the first leg. Canada’s Josh Liendo had an impressive 48.02 time as well, which came after having to swim both the 100 fly and 50 free beforehand. Jack Cartwright‘s 48.12 was the fastest time that he’s swam since 2018, and just 0.17 seconds off his best time of 47.97 from 2017. It was also faster than what Wiliam Yang and Zac Incerti went individually in the 100 free, showing that Australia made the right choice in picking him for this relay.

Country Swimmer Time
United States Ryan Held 47.93
Canada Josh Liendo 48.02
Australia Jack Cartwright 48.12
Great Britain Tom Dean 48.25
Italy Lorenzo Zazzeri 48.69
Brazil Garbiel Santos 48.73
Netherlands Stan Pijnenburg 48.80
China Hong Jinquan 48.88

Mens Rolling Splits

The Aussies gained the lead through a scorching 46.98 from Kyle Chalmers, who had the fastest male rolling split by 0.52 seconds. Although he hasn’t swam many races here at these World Championships, Chalmers has been a force on relays, having anchored the men’s 4×100 free relay in a 46.60 that pulled his team from fifth to second place. Canada’s Javier Acevedo had an impressive 47.96 split as well, considering that his flat start best time is a 49.12 and his fastest relay split before this meet was a 48.43.

Country Swimmer Time
Australia Kyle Chalmers 46.98
Italy Alessandro Miressi 47.50
United States Brooks Curry 47.72
Great Britain Lewis Burras 47.86
Canada Javier Acevedo 47.96
Brazil Vinicius Assuncao 48.03
Netherlands Jesse Puts 48.29
China Wang Changhao 48.86

Womens Rolling Splits

Mollie O’Callaghan had the fastest split out of all the women, swimming a 52.03 in typical O’Callaghan fashion. She opened in 25.11 before coming home in a blistering 26.92 to help the Aussies secure the world record. Her teammate, Madi Wilson, had an impressive 52.25 to rank fourth out of all the women swimming on this relay.

Notably, O’Callaghan and Wilson were the two women left off the Aussie finals squad that broke the women’s 4×100 free relay world record last year.

Charging on the final lap was Penny Oleksiak, who anchored in a 52.11 to help Canada overtake the United States for silver. Her split was the second-fastest out of all the women, just behind O’Callaghan. Another team-saving anchor leg was Marrit Steenbergen‘s as she threw down a 52.60 to bring the Dutch up from seventh to fifth place.

Coming after swimming the 50 fly and 50 free beforehand in the same session, Torri Huske had an impressive 52.60 split with a +0.00 reaction time.

Country Swimmer Time
Australia Mollie O’Callaghan 52.03
Canada Penny Oleksiak 52.11
Australia Madi Wilson 52.25
Canada Kayla Sanchez 52.52
Netherlands Marrit Steenbergen 52.57
United States Torri Huske 52.60
United States Claire Curzan 52.84
Great Britain Freya Anderson 53.06
Great Britain Anna Hopkin 53.27
Brazil Giovanna Diamante 53.98
Brazil Stephanie Balduccini 54.04
Italy Silvia di Pietro 54.19
Netherlands Tessa Giele 54.58
China Ai Yanhan 54.58
China Lao Lihui 54.60
Italy Chiara Tarantino 55.45

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Sub13
2 years ago

So looking at it now it seems fairly obvious.

Men’s leadoff: USA fastest, CAN 2nd, Aus 3rd

Men’s split: Aus fastest, USA 3rd, CAN 5th

Women’s splits: Aus fastest and 3rd, CAN 2nd and 4th, USA 6th and 7th

Fobby Binke
2 years ago

Mollie O’Callaghan was only ranked #57 in Swimswam’s Top 100 For 2022. So far, she already won 3 golds and 2 silver at Worlds, with medley relay still coming up, and posted fastest 100 free of the year.

https://swimswam.com/swimswams-top-100-for-2022-womens-75-51/

Justhereforfun
2 years ago

Just a thought experiment, which country will win in a 8×100 mixed freestyle relay? US has the depth on the men’s side, Australia has it on the women’s

Sub13
Reply to  Justhereforfun
2 years ago

My gut feeling:

Only using swimmers in Budapest: Toss up.

Using the actual best team: Aus.

US men won the relay by 1.46s but with an admittedly slowish Dressel leadoff (but not THAT much slower than usual)

Aus women beat USA in their relay by 1.63s.

But replacing Harris’s 53.00 split with McKeon’s 51.35 and Jack’s 52.65 with C1’s 51 high (she has been as fast as 50 high but obviously that’s not realistic) it becomes a blowout.

Gheko
2 years ago

The race was all but over after Jack’s 48.1 split, Kyle doing his usual demolition job, Madi finally getting her relay times down and Mollie likewise, Awesome job!🇦🇺🦘🇦🇺

Troyy
Reply to  Gheko
2 years ago

I was excited as soon as I saw how close Cartwright was but they still had to get the job done on the other legs.

Verram
Reply to  Gheko
2 years ago

The question now is – will Cartwright b continue on to Birmingham after his relay heroics or will the selectors stick to their guns ? Not a bad way to end his season if this is Jack’s last swim unless he gets picked for heats of medley relay

Sub13
Reply to  Verram
2 years ago

I don’t know if they can put him on the team and I doubt they’d be allowed to kick someone off. But if someone withdraws I assume he’d be in the conversation to be added very quickly.

Really, a WR is a pretty great for his season. He doesn’t need CGs

JVW
2 years ago

We’ve got to send some coaches to Australia to try and figure out how they develop all of these amazing female sprint freestylers.

MCH
Reply to  JVW
2 years ago

Pick me. Pick me.

CanSwim13
Reply to  JVW
2 years ago

Or Canada 😉

Sub13
2 years ago

Your sentence about Acevedo is wrong. He also split a 47.97 in the men’s free relay. But 48.43 was his fastest split before this meet.

nbcsports K
2 years ago

ofc nbc sports will post “michael andrew pb takes silver” but wont post this race and how the ausies broke the record. Rowdy’s biased commentary is such a joke and seemed almost disappointed that the aussies won with the WR smh

Olympics
Reply to  nbcsports K
2 years ago

What do you expect? He’s the announcer for the US ofc he’s biased. NBC usually posts if USA medals so I’m not sure abt that

JVW
Reply to  nbcsports K
2 years ago

You mean Rowdy is something of a homer? Next thing you know, you’ll try to tell me that he gets a little bit excitable when commenting.

And imagine a U.S. network focusing their online coverage on U.S. swimmers. The scandal!

Ol' Longhorn
Reply to  JVW
2 years ago

But ffs, it was a WR. Pathetic.

Troyy
Reply to  JVW
2 years ago

He was even a homer during ISL.

Breaststroke best stroke
Reply to  nbcsports K
2 years ago

They literally did. And as it turned out, the American commentator who is commentating for the American sports station is mainly highlighting Americans

There's no doubt that he's tightening up
2 years ago
  • Liendo is a beast, that’s how you handle a triple
  • You suspect that GB would’ve been better with Burras leading off and Dean second, with this order they could’ve pushed USA much closer. I do wonder whether Burras’ mediocre flying split opens the door for Dean to anchor the men’s medley relay — I speculated before the race that GB went with the Dean/Burras order to test out Burras’ relay split.
  • O’Callaghan’s 26.92 is pretty slow for her standards lol
  • Huske and Curzan have both dropped some nice relay splits this meet, good for them
Troyy

Also the US should’ve rested Held in the heats and then lead off Curry with Held second. Mollie pushed the fronthalf a bit more causing a bit slower backhalf. Curzan really overperformed compared to her flat starts in every relay she swam.

Verram
Reply to  Troyy
2 years ago

Being an experimental meet, I don’t mind Mollie pushing the front end a bit and see how she goes, because it’s part of her development as she gets older… she needs to get out faster if she wants to get down to low 52s or even down to 51s by Paris .. huske and Curzan may have developed sprint endurance by then and not die in the second 50 so Mollie needs to learn to go out fast with them in the first 50 I feel

Last edited 2 years ago by Verram
Fraser Thorpe

Huske and Curzan really stepped up in the relays. They’re going to bring others with them.

About Yanyan Li

Yanyan Li

Although Yanyan wasn't the greatest competitive swimmer, she learned more about the sport of swimming by being her high school swim team's manager for four years. She eventually ventured into the realm of writing and joined SwimSwam in January 2022, where she hopes to contribute to and learn more about …

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