When 14-year-old Luka Mijatovic swam a 4:17.07 in the 500 yard freestyle on Sunday at the Pleasanton Seahawks Senior Open, he knocked a whopping 2% off his own record in the event, which was previously 4:22.50. The swim also puts him 2.9% ahead of Lleyton Plattel (4:24.79), who is the second-fastest swimmer in that age group’s history.
That felt like a lot to me, so I asked SwimSwam stat guru Barry Revzin to help me put that in context.
While we stopped short of pulling #1 and #2 from each event in the All-Time Age Group Rankings (a project for another day), Barry pulled some good things:
- 2.9% is the equivalent of knocking 1.22 seconds off a 42-second 100 yard free.
- 2.9% behind Katie Ledecky’s World Record in the 800 free is 8:18.8.
- Remember when Katie Ledecky was changing the way we looked at women’s distance swimming? Her 13-14 500 yard free record is only 1.4% faster than Sippy Woodhead’s old record (and Claire Weinstein has closed that gap further).
- When Michael Phelps obliterated the 400 IM World Record in 2008, he was only .9% better than Laszlo Cseh swam at the same Olympics (though in total he knocked 3.14% off Tom Dolan’s prior world Record over the course of 8 record-setting swims).
Of course, the gold standard for rewriting short course yards records is one Caeleb Dressel. In 2018, when he swam his 17.63 in the 50 yard free, that was a whopping 4.55% faster than the next-fastest time in history in that event. Sarah Sjostrom’s 50 fly was next on that list at 2.55%, which at the time was a whopping number.
This could be one of those records that lasts for generations – there are already a bunch of those in boys’ distance swimming in the US. It could also be the beacon that encourages the chase. Either way, it’s a really special swim, one of those to bookmark in your memory.
Great article, great comment section. Articles like these are one of many reasons I read SwimSwam daily.
He swam for SCSC and now Seahawks. Does anybody know where he’s going to high school? I hope we get to see him at NCS! Unless he doesn’t swim HS… 🙁
Luka no doubt has a shot at the National High school record. I believe that’s around 4:12-4:14, depending if you take public or private high school.
didn’t conger go a 4:13 in high school?
Conger went 4:13 in 2013, breaking Jeff Kostoff’s legendary national high school record from the early 80s (which was 4:16).
However, Grant Shoults broke Conger’s record in 2016, going 4:12.87.
That in turn got broken by Rex Mauer in 2023. Mauer went 4:12.70.
Impressive. But competition is much tougher in LCM than SCY for many reasons: the most important swimming competitions are in LCM; SCY is only swim in the US, and many of the world’s best swimmers have never seriously (or at all) swum SCY; age group swimming is it’s own thing, the development of talent and potential into adulthood is different for everyone, and the craziest drops naturally always happen with age group records. There isn’t much sense in comparing his development to the LCM greats just yet; of course it’s fun (interesting article nonetheless), but I feel like it should come with a disclaimer.
The disclaimer: Last summer he went a 400m in 3:52 / 800m in 7:59 He’s taking it back to the Hackett, Thorpe era. He’ll go 3:45 or 3:46 in the olympic year. Sub 7:50 in the 800. He’ll be in the mix for the team in the 400m. If he gets 3rd he’ll only have to drop 2-3 seconds to be on a world championship team.
Yeah…his 400 meter free record (when he was just a few months into 14) is 2.1% better than the next-best US 13-14 year old. So that’s also super impressive.
I meant more like “Of course, the gold standard for rewriting short course yards records is one Caeleb Dressel. In 2018, when he swam his 17.63 in the 50 yard free, that was a whopping 4.55% faster than the next-fastest time in history in that event. Sarah Sjostrom’s 50 fly was next on that list at 2.55%, which at the time was a whopping number (although competition is overall much tougher internationally and in LCM, so that should be taken into consideration as well.)”
Nobody is denying Mijatovic’s talent and immense potential, but my comment about age group swimming still stands. For example, Ledecky was about 4-5 seconds faster than Titmus at ages 14-16 in the 400… Read more »
When does he turn 15?
April of next year
April 21
Never. Gonna keep breaking this record for years to come!
Of course, the gold standard for rewriting short course yards records is one Caeleb Dressel. In 2018, when he swam his 17.63 in the 50 yard free, that was a whopping 4.55% faster than the next-fastest time in history in that event. Sarah Sjostrom’s 50 fly was next on that list at 2.55%, which at the time was a whopping number.
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Why do we mix SCY with LCM?
Only Americans swim SCY.
If all the world’s top swimmers swim SCY, I’m 100% sure the gap between SCY record and the second fastest is a lot closer.
Believer it or not, there are plenty of fast non-Americans that swim SCY as well.
Believe it or not, not all world’s top swimmers swim SCY.
You don’t think sprinters like Manadou, mcEvoy, Proud etc etc would have made the gap much smaller between Dressel’s 50 SCY record and the second fastest?
Or that MOC would have obliterated Missy Franklin’s 200 SCY record?
Nobody is stopping them from trying and while you did list many of them that never did, many others did. You only ever race and compete against who shows us, and this is who EVER showed up even once.
It wasnt implied it was apples to apples, its a fact. Sure you can add context that different athletes focus on different events. Phelps rarely competed yards tappered and had few SCM raced primed either. Does every male even just default to ‘well if Phelps wanted to…”
fwiw I think that while MOC might be able to break that record, should would not have obliterated it. She’s about a second faster than peak Ledecky (a little less) and Ledecky barely got within a second of that record. So it’s a “probably but close.” And SCY isn’t done in a vacuum; there are plenty of international comps over the years. Cielo never went faster than 18.47; the year after that he went 21.32 LC and then the supersuited 20.91 in 2009. So he was only 3 tenths behind Dressel in the big pool but 8 tenths back in SC.
And Missy Franklin’s 200 LCM PB is 2 seconds slower than MOC
Also, if you watched Fukuoka, you’d have known that MOC has better turns than both Ledecky and Missy.
The point is, if all world’s top swimmers swam SCY, the gap between the SCY records and the second place is a lot smaller.
Therefore, why mixing and comparing SCY gap with LCM.
Also, 200 free SCY is more relatable to 100 free LCM. So you shouldn’t make Ledecky’s 200 SCY as example.
And MOC is double 100 free world champion and 200 free WR holder.
Sarah Sjostrom, who is 100 free world record holder and has faster 200 LCM PB than Missy, also would have broken Missy 200 SCY record.
And guess what,
Mallory Commerford whose 200 LCM PB is more than 4 second slower than MOC, is closer than anyone else to Missy 200 SCY record. Ditto Simone Manuel.
It shows that 200 SCY is closer to 100 LCM.
Keep in mind one of the times in the mix for scy gap was the current world record holder…
Could the folks you mentioned lower that gap post collegiately? Maybe. But then, dressel could have been faster had he focused on it post collegiately.
Is it a pretty fair assessment given the cielo was one of the next fastest times? I think so
Wonder about the women’s 2 breast WR percentage 1.4 seconds ahead of 2nd all time
Dressel is alien with that 50