Connor Jaeger is having the best year of his career. The distance swimmer from the University of Michigan, qualified for the London Olympic team in 2012, and has qualified to swim 4 events in Barcelona at the 2013 World Championship Team for Team USA. Jaeger is coming off a great NCAA season. This year he won the 50o yard freestyle and the 1650 yard freestyle at the NCAA Championships. He was named an NCAA All-American in the 200 yard freestyle, 500 yard freestyle, 1,650 yard freestyle, and 800 yard freestyle relay. He was also named the 2012-13 University of Michigan Male Athlete of the Year as well as the 2013 Big Ten Swimmer of the Year.
At the 2013 World Championship Trials, Jaeger won the 400 meter freestyle, the 800 meter freestyle, and the 1500 meter freestyle as well as finishing 6th in the 200 meter freestyle to become the 2nd alternate on the 4×200 relay. With three individual swims already, Jaeger decided to scratch the 200 freestyle, bumping his teammate and training partner, Michael Klueh, into the second alternate position. Jaeger’s scratch makes room on the World Championship Roster for Michael Klueh to represent Team USA in Barcelona.
Klueh has come up short of making Team USA several times in the past year. At the 2012 Olympic Trials in Omaha, he was the only swimmer in the final heat of the 200 free to not make the team. In several other events, he missed being one of the top two finishers by one position. He had several other close calls at the meet this week, but was never successful in making the team.
Michael Klueh swam for the University of Texas in college and now trains with Club Wolverine at the University of Michigan.
Megan Romano and Chelsea Chenault
Who are the women going to both WC and WUGs?? I don’t see why they shouldn’t do both.
I don’t think he did it to let his buddy in. He’s got a HEAVY schedule.
And we are trying to out our best squads together, not give everyone a trophy. You want a spot- EARN it… If you earn a few, you have the right to pass to give yourself and TEAM USA a better chance to medal.
That’s all this.
And the girls going to both WC’s and WUG’s earned it.
He only had an alternate spot on that relay, he was not swimming it. Scratching that event has no effect on his racing schedule.
But he’s got to swim prelims and finals of the 400 on day 1, prelims of 800 on day 3, hopefully finals of the 800 on day 4, then two off days till he has to swim the mile prelims on day 7 and hopefully finals on day 8…
The 4×200 prelims are day 6, a day he’ll need to rest. It’s likely the alternates will be called in for prelims as Lochte has the 100 fly that session and his worst night with fly semi’s and 2bk final, and the 200 IM final is the night before, so using Dwyer in prelims is unlikely…
Basically, we almost always utilize the alternates as we have so many doublers and… Read more »
The only person on that relay with a heavy schedule is Lochte. Dwyer has 2 Individual races. McLean has 1, and Houchin only has the relay. Jaeger was the second alternate, so Berens will get pulled in before Klueh will. Berens might take Lochte’s spot in prelims but none of the other schedules are too heavy for a prelim swim. On top of that, If Jaeger hadn’t scratched, he has a busier schedule than 4 of the other 5 guys, so there is no way he would be swimming the relay either way.
So prelims will probably be Klueh, McClean, Berens, and Houchin, and finals will be the top 2 from prelims plus Dwyer and Lochte, right?
I think what’s really going on is this: the coaches select the relays in Barcelona. They could still put Jaeger on the relay. There was an extra spot open on the roster, and this was a clever way to get Klueh into the meet, and gives them one more capable body to eat up a prelims relay spot, and perhaps hit a great taper and earn his way into finals.
The coaches can select anyone from the team to swim at Worlds, regardless of whether this week they declined a relay alternate position.
My guess is that we see both Jaeger and Klueh swim in prelims of the 800 free relay.
I guess my point is its not being done to let everyone have a chance. It’s being done to give Team USA a better chance to win.
And the second comment is just ludicrous… This is international swimming, not summer league. Not everyone gets a chance, not everyone gets a trophy.
Conner Jaeger is a class act. It would be nice to see the same kind of sportsmanship on the women’s roster, a couple of the women on the World’s roster are going to both WUG’s and WC. It would be nice to see them choose and give their spots to the alternates.
Chelsea Chenault IS an alternate for WCs
What a class act. This is the type of sportsmanship we hope our younger athletes see. Congratulations to both gentlemen. Swim fast in Barcelona!