Florida’s Clark Beach Tops UVA’s Justin Grender in 200 Back Swim-Off For 8th

2021 NCAA MEN’S SWIMMING & DIVING CHAMPIONSHIPS

  • When: Wednesday, March 24 – Saturday, March 27, 2021
  • Where: Greensboro Aquatic Center / Greensboro, NC (Eastern Time Zone)
  • Prelims 10 AM/ Finals 6 PM (Local Time)
  • Short course yards (SCY) format
  • Defending champion: Cal (1x) – 2019 results
  • Streaming:
  • Championship Central
  • Psych Sheets
  • Live Results

This morning we saw our first — and last — swim off for an A-final spot this meet, as Florida’s Clark Beach and UVA’s Justin Grender tied for 8th place in the 200 back with a 1:40.20 each. Beach had been 1:39-something four times in his career, with his lifetime best of 1:39.37 coming from the 2019 NCAA Championships. Grender’s time this morning was a lifetime best by nearly half a second, as he came into the meet with a best of 1:40.63 from last month’s ACC Championships. Grender’s initial mark this morning appears to have set a new UVA school record by 0.01s.

30 minutes after prelims ended, the two matched up side by side to determine who would get to swim into tonight’s A-final. The two were evenly matched for the first 75, although Beach pulled ahead on that turn, only for Grender to close the gap. Clark finally put Grender away on the final turn, touching in 1:40.02, with Grender finishing a little under a second behind at 1:40.96.

With Beach into the A-final, the Gators have two A-finalists and one B-finalist tonight, while the Cavaliers have one A-finalist and three B-finalists.

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Swamswim
3 years ago

That uva record will be crushed next year by Jack Aikins lol

Nonrevhoofan
Reply to  Swamswim
3 years ago

Justin will have another year to get better. Not willing to concede the record yet; look what Keefer Barnum did when Noah Nichols absconded with the 100 Breast record!

Aquaman
3 years ago

Tough to swim 3 200 backs -especially from the consols. I’d be interested in how the loser of a swim off performs on average at night

WahooSwimFan
Reply to  Aquaman
3 years ago

Any knowledge of times in the swim off? 1:40. High is kinda vague

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