Sprint freestyler and backstroker David Puczkowski from CLASS Aquatics in Camarillo, California has verbally committed to the Cal Golden Bears.
Puczkowski has plenty of room to grow (his berecruited profile lists him at 6’1 and just 155 pounds), but is already a Summer Juniors qualifier. In yards, his bests are:
- 50 free – 20.94
- 100 free – 45.69
- 100 back – 48.56
- 200 back – 1:49.17
He’s an even better long course swimmer than he is a short course swimmer; at this summer’s Junior Nationals, he won the B-Final of the 100 meter backstroke in 56.58. He’s also been 23.80 in the 50 free in long course and 52.55 in the 100 free.
While Cal is stacked for years to come in their backstroke lineup, Puczkowski is good enough to be a freshman scorer at Pac-12’s in the 100 for sure, and probably two seasons from now the 200 as well (he has no official times in the 200 from last year).
He’ll have a tougher road to hit those same thresholds in the sprint freestyles, where the Pac-12 is considerably deeper, but is the kind of guy who in a few years could work his way onto Cal’s 200 and 400 free relays.
Puczkowski has been targeted by Cal likely because of his progressions. In the 100 free, for example, he went from 48.1 to 45.6 as a junior. That’s the most significant of his improvements, but he also dropped over a second in the 100 back.
Puczkowski swims for Westlake High School and was 3rd at the 2014 CIF Southern Section Division I Championship meet in the 100 back.
yeah!! go bears! would love to see him further develop at cal.
Another awesome recruit for Cal. Go Bears!
Thanks for the story/info, Braden. So nice to read your write-ups, as you add so much more to the story than just a person’s verbal commitment statement. You give us context about the athletes, which is really appreciated. Swimswam is my favorite site to check on a daily basis 🙂