One of the top age group swimmers in the country has joined the best high school team of 2023.
Kayla Han, the reigning U.S. Junior National champion in two events and the owner of seven National Age Group Records, is set to attend Carmel High School this season and has already joined Carmel Swim Club to train.
Han, who is entering her sophomore year of high school, has trained and competed with La Mirada Armada, a club located in the Southern California city of the same name, since the beginning of 2020. Prior to that, she raced for Brea Aquatics, also based in SoCal.
The 15-year-old is coming off winning the girls’ 1500 freestyle (16:16.94) and 400 IM (4:42.32) at the U.S. Junior National Championships in early August, setting new lifetime bests in both.
One month prior, she finished seventh in the 400 IM at U.S Nationals in Indianapolis while also earning top 16 finishes in the 1500 free (12th), 800 free (14th) and 400 free (16th).
She also won silver in the girls’ 400 IM at the 2022 Junior Pan Pacific Championships in Honolulu.
A bonafide standout thus far in her young career, Han is set to join a Carmel High School team that’s coming off a dominant 2023 season, as the squad headed up by Alex Shackell, Molly Sweeney and Lynsey Bowen won the team’s record 37th straight Indiana state title in February.
As a result of the dominant performance, the Carmel girls were named “Team Of The Year” by USA Today on August 1.
Han currently owns seven U.S. NAG records, including the 13-14 mark in the SCY 400 IM at 4:06.95. She also holds a trio of 10 & under records and three more marks in the 11-12 age group.
Despite only turning 15 in the last couple of months, Han already ranks 19th all-time in the 15-16 age group with her 400 IM performance at Junior Nationals.
Han will join Carmel’s elite training program, led by coach Chris Plumb, which includes the aforementioned Shackell, Sweeney and Bowen, who all just finished their sophomore years of high school, along with Ellie Clarke, who has a similar skillset to Han and recently won the U.S. Junior National title in the 200 back at 13.
Another one of Carmel’s top swimmers last year, Berit Berglund, is set to join the University of Texas for her freshman year this fall.
This year’s state meet should be fun(sarcasm). If you don’t break a State Meet Record, you aren’t winning! Even if you break a record, you could be 2nd or 3rd…
Caremel’s HC not only recruits his swimmers do so as well. IHSAA does not seem to care about swimming transfers. (Although a kid coming in from another state is not likely to violate HS transfer rules.)
Stop being a troll and stop being so ignorant.
I beg to differ. I feel that Carmel is such an amazing place to live and also the high school is so dominant in so many things, including non-sports extracurriculars that they do not need to recruit… people just want to go there. Having said that, my family moved to Carmel, and My swimmers were definitely not recruited because their reputation speaks for itself. There’s no recruiting needed. Trust me lol.
Ignorant comment filled with the taste of sour grapes. They don’t recruit, I know this for a fact. We’ve been fortunate enough to finish 2nd to this program 3 times, none of which was truly affected by transfer rules, or the IHSAA.
The city of Carmel is an attractive place to live with great schools. In addition, they happen to have a world-class, not a state-class, swimming program.
Chris is one of the brightest minds in the sport, rounded-out by a phenomenal coaching staff. While it’s easier to justify their greatness by slinging this type of mud, it’s short-sighted and it’s disrespectful to those athletes and coaches at Carmel.
Zach DeWitt
Franklin Regional Swim Team
Not sure if I’d move from socal to indiana even if I was guaranteed gold medals and world records.
Have you been to Carmel? I’ve been to SoCal… you can have it.
How does she end up in Indiana from CA? Mom and/or Dad somehow get transferred to the Carmel, IN area for their jobs. If not, I am not a huge fan of parents who drop everything and move 1/2 across for their child’s sports…..Who’s journey is this? What kind of life lesson is this for her? She seemed to be doing fine where she was…
Gonna say they prolly have a better handle on what they’re doing than you do.
Parents thinking the grass is always greener…Let’s hope it doesn’t hurt her improvement trajectory. She was doing great where she was.
Zach Morris, Lisa Turtle, and Screech Powers (and Mr. Belding) did it the opposite way — went from Indiana to Southern California. They turned out mostly ok.
Combination of factors perhaps? Living in Socal is an expensive endeavor. Maybe moving to Indiana was best for the whole family
I HIGHLY doubt the move was a financial one.
Olympic trials are looming so maybe she’s doing whatever it takes to get the times needed.
Normal in other college sports, lets not hope they hired her parent to some job in school there as is the case in other sports =D … it is a free world, they can do what ever they like with their money
Happens all the time in gymnastics. Those gold medals largely come from factory gyms, not mom and pops.
quite a big move for that family
and, might I add, CHS will obliterate the girls state meet this year, and next year. All the years really, but especially the next two.
Unlike many suburbs in Ohio, Carmel has always had just the one HS – 5400 students as of a few yrs ago. I believe all schools swim in the same division at the state meet.
Not the club I thought she would transfer to, but congrats…
she was roommates with alex shackell at jr pan pacs so makes sense
Sure, I’ll bite:
Shipherd runs one of the heavier volume programs out of SCS. Given Kayla’s improvement trajectory under him, I imagine she will still want more than what most SCS programs would have to offer, and would need a pretty significant sales pitch to draw her away from what’s clearly working for her. So where did you think she would transfer?
That being said, Carmel is on fire right now.
Sandpipers is where
She tried. They told her no.
How come?
If what you say is true that Sandpipers said no, perhaps her parents wanted her to attend school? Doesn’t Ron require homeschooling of his elite crowd?
maybe she wants to swim HS season .. Carmel’s girl’s team is a dynasty … 3 years with CHS and they hit 40 straight state titles. Nice round number.
Mega-yardage aside, not all swimmers that have transferred to SAND have thrived in the ultra-controlling environment. Not everyone is willing to drink the Kool-aid.
A club team turned down a swimmer? Now I have heard of everything!
Seriously??
I highly doubt that
File this one under “things that didn’t happen”.
it did happen. they told her no.