Disclaimer: Dolfin Swim of the Week is not meant to be a conclusive selection of the best overall swim of the week, but rather one Featured Swim to be explored in deeper detail. The Dolfin Swim is an opportunity to take a closer look at the context of one of the many fast swims this week, perhaps a swim that slipped through the cracks as others grabbed the headlines, or a race we didn’t get to examine as closely in the flood of weekly meets.
Team USA sent a slew of different teams to different competitions this summer: an ‘A’ team to World Championships, a ‘B’ team to World University Games and a ‘C’ team to Pan American Games, plus a junior team to the World Junior Championships.
Yet today, the junior team of boys turned out to be better than most of the senior groups. The American 4×200 free relay at World Juniors surged to gold, smashing the world junior record by 2.6 seconds and beating the times put up by any teams at both the World University Games and the Pan American Games.
Jake Magahey, Luca Urlando, Jake Mitchell and Carson Foster went 7:08.37 in that relay. That time blows out the U.S. relays at Pan Ams (7:14.82) and World University Games (7:09.77) and actually would have made the final at the senior World Championships.
Here’s a comparison to some of this summer’s top relays:
- US World Juniors team (Magahey, Urlando, Mitchell, Foster): 7:08.37 – gold
- US World University Games team (Farris, House, Julian, Apple): 7:09.77 – gold
- US Pan American Games team (Kibler, House, Pomajevich, Wieser): 7:14.82 – silver
- Brazil Pan American Games team (Melo, Scheffer, de Lucca, Correia): 7:10.66 – gold
Here’s how the junior team’s individual splits lined up with the splits from Team USA’s other finals relays (finals splits only, no prelims included):
- Blake Pieroni, World Champs – 1:44.98
- Townley Haas, World Champs – 1:45.16
- Andrew Seliskar, World Champs – 1:45.81 (leadoff)
- Zach Apple, World Champs – 1:46.03
- Carson Foster, World Juniors – 1:46.10
- Zach Apple, Universiade – 1:46.16
- Trenton Julian, Universiade – 1:46.99
- Jake Mitchell, World Juniors – 1:47.03
- Luca Urlando, World Juniors – 1:47.13
- Drew Kibler, Pan Ams – 1:47.31 (leadoff)
- Grant House, Universiade – 1:47.89
- Jake Magahey, World Juniors – 1:48.11 (leadoff)
- Grant House, Pan Ams – 1:48.31
- Dean Farris, Universiade – 1:48.73 (leadoff)
- Sam Pomajevich, Pan Ams – 1:49.34
- Chris Wieser, Pan Ams – 1:49.86
With most of the key spots on Team USA’s relay still wide open heading into the 2020 Tokyo Olympic year, the four boys from this World Juniors relay could be charging toward Olympic berths while still in high school – all four are still rising high school seniors who should graduate just a month or so before U.S. Olympic Trials next year.
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My oh my…huge time difference compared to the Pan Am Team
If also not-Usa swimmers may be considered, my swim of the week is Franko Grgic’ win in the 800 free at Junior Worlds in 7.45.92.
At Panam the 800 free were won by Abruzzo in 7.54.70 and at WUG by Nikitin in 7.56.65, so Grgic was far faster, and his 7.45.92 would have easily made the final at senior World Championships (only Paltrinieri was slighty faster in the heats).
And then I consider the huge potential that 16 year-old Grgic seems to have.
And the silver and bronze medalists at juniors were also fast -rising
Would have loved to have seen Kieran Smith swim a leg on an 800 free relay this summer. He has the top time individually with his 1:46.21 from Summer Nationals I guess that’s what you get with the crappy selection system a year ahead of time
Lot of talent in that relay line -up !!! Superb race & splits
Bruh🤯