2023 SUMMER JUNIOR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS
- July 31 – August 4, 2023
- LCM (50 meters)
- William Woollett Jr. Aquatics Center, Irvine, California, United States
- Meet Central
- Complete Results
The Carmel Swim Club girls captured the girls team high point title at the 2023 US Summer Junior National Championships, scoring a total of 292.5 points, winning the team title on the final relay.
Top 5 Girls High Point Team Scores
- Carmel Swim Club, 292.5
- Crow Canyon Sharks, 288
- Mission Viejo Nadadore, 244
- Bellevue Club Swim Team, 231
- Long Island Aquatic Club, 212
Carmel and Crow Canyon were in a title battle the whole meet, and the team battle came down to the final event of the meet, the girls 4×100 medley relay.
In the relay, Carmel got out to the lead ahead of Crow Canyon on the backstroke leg, but Crow Canyon took the lead at the end of the breaststroke leg. The two relays were home to the fastest two 100 butterfly splits as Alex Shackell split a 57.51 for Carmel and Bailey Hartman split a 58.72 for Crow Canyon. Those were the only two sub-1:00 fly legs of the whole field. At the end of the fly leg, Carmel had the lead by 1.14 seconds. The lead was too much to overcome, and Carmel went on to win in a new 15-18 national age group (NAG) record of a 4:06.18.
The Carmel girls high point title was a team effort. Out of their 11 total girls, six of them scored individual points. 16-year-old Lynsey Bowen led the way with 47 individual points, including a win in the 800 free, a 5th place finish in the 400 free, and a 6th place finish in the 200 free.
The girls relays were also a huge contribution to their win. All five of their ‘A’ relays finished top eight. They won two relays (4×50 free and 4×100 medley), finished 2nd in two (4×100 free and 4×200 free), and were 7th in the 4×50 medley. Out of those ‘A’ relays, seven out of the 11 girls in attendance at the meet swam on at least one of them, once again contributing to the team effort.
In total, over half of their points came from relays as they scored 113.5 individual points out of their 292.5 total.
Carmel needed to have their World Championship medalist come back and swim a few events in order to win this one! Shoutout to Crow Canyon, a team of 160 athletes, for nearly winning Juniors.