2020 INTERNATIONAL SWIMMING LEAGUE
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After matches 7 and 8, which concluded yesterday, November 6th in Budapest, London Roar is tied with Energy Standard in slot #2 among the ISL league-wide rankings.
Roar, whose arsenal includes such weapons as Adam Peaty, Freya Anderson, Alia Atkinson, and Guilherme Guido, are mathematically into the final 8 headed to the semifinals, but still have a regular-season match starting on Monday, November 9th.
Adding to the post-season excitement is the fact that another teammate will be joining the Roar, as Japan’s Katsumi Nakamura has confirmed to SwimSwam he is headed to Budapest on Tuesday.
Nakamura has appeared on the Roar roster since early in the season but has yet to make it to the bubble and actually compete for the squad. That will change come the semifinals when the freestyle sprint specialist will join his team in a bid to make the final 4.
Nakamura owns a lifetime best SCM 50 free time of 21.16 from 2018 and is the national record holder in the SCM 100 free with his PB of 46.22 from that same year. The former would rank as the 5th fastest mark in this ISL season 2 league-wide, while the latter would rank 8th if he would have replicated it thus far this season.
However, where Nakamura will most likely make his biggest impact is in the men’s 4x100m freestyle relay, where London has taken a hit on occasion. The Roar ‘A’ relay has placed as high as 2nd in match #5 but its ‘B’ squad has been as slow as 7th in match #2.
Expanding to the entire league, however, Roar’s best time of 3:07.29 ranks just 10th. That relay from match #5 included the following splits:
- Marius Kusch 46.54
- Duncan Scott 46.68
- Vini Lanza 46.71
- Mikhail Vekovishchev 47.36
Assuming Nakamura is at least good for a conservative 46-mid rolling start, just his addition alone could get the Roar more in the 3:05-high/3:06-low range to rival the likes of the Cali Condors and LA Current when it counts.
We have reached out to London Roar for comment on plans for Nakamura.
ISL Season 2 Team Rankings after Match #8:
The loss of Chalmers & Graham has certainly left a significant hole in LON’s male ranks, both in individual context but esp relays. This could at least be a partial fix.
It has to be said that this season is operating under exceptional circumstances but I do think the current “fudge factor” re late signings, places on roster and eligibility of such swimmers for semis/finals needs greater clarity.
I don’t think you should be able to add to the roster late but he’s been on the whole time so I think this is ok. It could be recovery from injury or anything that delayed him, so it’s no different from Nic fink suddenly popping up after a few matches.
I’m surprised he wasn’t recruited by the Tokyo Froga Kings.
I felt this way last year when Daiya Seto came to the final and set a world record in the 400 IM and that is that a team should only be able to use swimmers in the post season (quarterfinal, semifinal and/or final) that have competed in at least 1 match during the regular season.
I agree. Weird to just come right before Semis.
I do hope they institute such a rule in a normal season but they were never gonna do that this year with so many swimmers absent. ISL already announced months ago that swimmers were welcome to join the bubble for the semis and final if they can’t make the season. That said it seems unlikely Nakamura was absent because of covid19.