2024 Winter Junior Championships – East
- December 11-14, 2024
- Greensboro, NC
- SCY (25 yards)
- Event Page
- Meet Central
- Live Results
- High Point Rankings
Charlotte Crush and Baylor Stanton walked away with the High Point Awards at the 2024 Winter Junior Championships – East, with the competition wrapping up on Saturday in Greensboro.
Crush scored 93 individual points to lead the girls by a wide margin, while Stanton scored 89 on the boys’ side to top runner-up Thomas Heilman (80).
GIRLS’ RECAP
It was a busy meet for Crush, as the 16-year-old raced 17 times during the four-day meet, and it would’ve been one more if she hadn’t been disqualified in the heats of the 200 IM.
After a pair of impressive relay lead-offs on Wednesday night, hitting season-bests in the 50 back (23.56) and 200 free (1:45.56) on the Lakeside 200 medley and 800 free relays, Crush kicked into high gear on Thursday night.
After placing third in the 50 free in a season-best time of 22.04, Crush broke the girls’ 15-16 National Age Group Record in the 100 back leading off the 400 medley relay, clocking 49.46 to erase her own 49.53 mark set last year. More impressively, she tied Claire Curzan‘s 17-18 NAG record with the swim, tying her for the fastest 18 & over swimmer in U.S. history.
Crush continued to dominate the meet the rest of the way, sweeping the 100 fly (50.13) and 100 back (50.01) on Friday while leading off the Lakseside 200 free relay (22.36) that finished third. Her swim in the 100 fly marked a new best time, ranking her #2 all-time in the 15-16 age group behind Curzan (49.51).
On Saturday, she broke the meet record twice in the 200 back, breaking 1:50 for the first time in the prelims in 1:48.93, and then getting down to 1:48.69 in the final, ranking her #2 all-time in the 15-16 age group behind Regan Smith (1:48.30).
One event later, Crush was the runner-up in the 100 free in a time of 47.85, ranking her #8 all-time in the 15-16 age group.
With individual wins in the 100 back, 200 back and 100 fly, plus a runner-up finish in the 100 free and a third-place showing in the 50 free, Crush finished with 93 points at the meet, leading the girls’ field by 12.
Ranking second was Scarlet Aquatics’ Chloe Kim, who won the girls’ 500 free (4:42.33) and 1650 free (16:00.21) and added ‘A’ final appearances in the 200 fly, 200 IM and 400 IM for 81 points.
Fifteen-year-old standout Audrey Derivaux rounded out the top three with 77 points, winning the 200 fly (1:55.18), 200 IM (1:55.24) and 400 IM (4:06.11) while finishing second in the 200 back.
Girls’ High Point Rankings
- Charlotte Crush (Lakeside Swim Team), 93
- Chloe Kim (Scarlet Aquatics), 81
- Audrey Derivaux (Jersey Wahoos), 77
- Annie Jia (Upper Dublin Aquatic Club), 71
- Elle Scott (SwimMAC Carolina), 69.5
- Reina Liu (TAC Titans), 67
- Molly Sweeney (Carmel Swim Club), 62
- Rylee Erisman (Windermere Lakers), 55.5
- Addie Robillard (Mason Manta Rays), 53
- Sarah Rodrigues (Jersey Aquatic Center), 52
BOYS’ RECAP
Stanton set a trio of best times en route to winning three events and making ‘A’ final appearances in three others to lead all boys with 89 individual points in Greensboro. That count would’ve been higher if he hadn’t been disqualified in the final of the 200 IM, where he reportedly flinched at the start.
The 17-year-old came out on top in the boys’ 100 back (47.07) and 200 back (1:40.89) with new season-best times, and added a new lifetime best of 3:41.50 en route to winning the 400 IM, outpacing the field by more than four seconds. The performance ranks him 10th all-time in the boys’ 17-18 age group.
Stanton also set new personal bests in the 200 fly (1:45.02) and 500 free (4:17.92), placing fourth and fifth, respectively, and he was seeded second coming into the 200 IM final before his disqualification.
Ranking second with 80 points was Heilman, also 17, who set a pair of National Age Group Records and a total of four personal best times at the meet.
Heilman broke the boys’ 17-18 NAG record in the 100 fly twice, first clocking 44.55 in the prelims before getting down to 43.86 in the final, making him the fastest swimmer in age group history by 89 one-hundredths of a second.
He followed up by smashing the NAG record in the 200 fly, clocking 1:38.95 to crack the previous mark of 1:40.39 set by Aiden Hayes in 2022 (Hayes also held the old 100 fly NAG at 44.75).
Heilman added a win in the 200 IM, setting a best time of 1:41.26 to rank #3 all-time in the 17-18 age group, and his 200 free time of 1:32.26 leading off the Cavalier Aquatics 800 free relay ranks him #5 for 17-18s.
Heilman also won the 50 free (19.26) to go a perfect four-for-four in individual finals.
Finishing just one point back of Heilman was Lakeside’s Thomas Mercer, who had runner-up finishes in the 100 back (47.27), 200 fly (1:43.88) and 200 IM (1:43.26), and he was also an ‘A’ finalist in the 200 back and 400 IM to score 79 points.
Boys’ High Point Rankings
- Baylor Stanton (Gwinnett Aquatics), 89
- Thomas Heilman (Cavalier Aquatics), 80
- Thomas Mercer (Lakeside Swim Team), 79
- Noah Cakir (Team Suffolk), 67
- Austin Carpenter (Central Ohio Aquatics), 61
- Luke Bedsole (Huntsville Swim Association), 60
- Ethan Ekk (Area Tallahassee Aquatic Club), 57
- Norvin Clontz (Mecklenburg Swim Association), 53
- Ryan Erisman (Laker Swim), 48
- Jason Zhao (Mason Manta Rays), 47
