NCAA Champion Jasmine Nocentini Turning Pro, Reveals Future Training Plans

Jasmine Nocentini, the 2024 NCAA Champion in the 100 yard breaststroke, is pursuing a career in professional swimming and will return home to train in Italy, she told SwimSwam on Tuesday.

Nocentini, 22, began her college career at Florida International and Northwestern before finishing last season at the University of Virginia, where she exploded to become a key contributor to their 4th-straight NCAA team title. There she won the 100 breaststroke in 56.09, was 3rd in the 50 free in 21.10, and 4th in the 100 free in 47.00.

Nocentini’s Time Progression at Each School:

At FIU At Northwestern At Virginia
50 free 22.28 21.59 21.10
100 free 48.93 47.76 46.75
100 breast DNS 58.31 56.09

Nocentini’s swim in the 100 breaststroke is the 3rd-best performance of all-time behind only two Lilly King swims.

She had one year of collegiate eligibility remaining (explained here).

Nocentini, who was a member of Italy’s team at the 2023 European Short Course Championships last December, hasn’t competed since the NCAA Championships in March.

She says that after five years in the United States, she took a break to spend some time with her family and is now back in training based out of the University of Iowa. She plans to stay there until November to “get back in shape” while training with George Durin.

Durin is a former swimmer at NCAA Division II school Colorado Mesa University who swam his last collegiate meet in 2022. Like Nocentini, he was a breaststroker, with a best time of 55.95 at the RMAC Championships (at altitude) his senior year where he finished 5th.

He is currently a volunteer assistant at Washington High School in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

After that she will return to Italy to train out of the Federal Center there.

The next step for Nocentini will be turning her short course results into long course performances. She has always been a better short course course swimmer than long course swimmer, but the current gaps are more reflective of her extreme focus on short course swimming while in America. She hasn’t been a best time in the 100 free or 100 breaststroke in long course, for example, since 2018, but based on her short course progressions is almost-assuredly capable of better times.

Best Times in Long Course:

  • 50 free – 25.04 (November 2023)
  • 100 free – 57.57 (August 2018)
  • 100 breast – 1:13.57 (August 2018)

Nocentini did not attend Italy’s Olympic Trials in March.

A deep Italian women’s breaststroking group is showing some signs of aging. In the 2023-2024 season, they had three women ranked in the top 30 globally in the 100 breaststroke, led by #5 Benedetta Pilato. All four were under 1:07. In the last Olympic year in 2021, however, they had three of the top nine globally.

The Italian 400 free relay was 8th in prelims and finals with the same lineup in each round. Their slowest splits were 54.2 (on rolling starts) so that would be a target for Nocentini to qualify for those relays going forward.

The country only entered one woman in the 50 free at the Olympics: 18-year-old Sara Curtis, who was 14th in the semi-finals in 24.77.

Nocentini left Italy well before swimming in the NCAA: her family moved to Panama when she was 12 years old.

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Swimmerj
10 days ago

Wild that UVA will lose a 56.0 breaststroker and be completely fine in the 400 medley relay due to last year’s 49 butterflyer having split 56.7 in breaststroke in the past.

YGBSM
10 days ago

How does anyone train “out of” anywhere? Do you train somewhere and then leave?

Answer: It is train/trains “at”.

Hmmmm
Reply to  YGBSM
9 days ago

You should make this your tinder bio

Old Swim Coach
10 days ago

Hard to get faster in LCM if you don’t race LCM. Hard to imagine that she couldn’t rip at least a 1:07 100 breast this past summer.

Future Uncertain / End is Near
11 days ago

I hear Shane might be available.

cow from china
11 days ago

What is that 100 lcm breast time lmao

Meathead
11 days ago

horrible decision…drop 2 seconds in the 100 breast and 1 second in the 100 free and leave?!?!?!? meanwhile your UVA teammates are dominating on the world stage….bad call

IU Swammer
Reply to  Meathead
11 days ago

It seems like she needed to take a break. Training with UVA is a great option, but if she’s wanting to focus on LCM, joining Italy’s training group is not a bad call.

Last edited 11 days ago by IU Swammer
Swim
11 days ago

did she really forego a year of eligibility, or did her waiver for a 6th season get denied?

Inthedeepend
11 days ago

Why wouldn’t she be training at UVA where she found tons of recent success?

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Braden Keith

Braden Keith is the Editor-in-Chief and a co-founder/co-owner of SwimSwam.com. He first got his feet wet by building The Swimmers' Circle beginning in January 2010, and now comes to SwimSwam to use that experience and help build a new leader in the sport of swimming. Aside from his life on the InterWet, …

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