2024 BRISBANE SENIOR METRO CHAMPIONSHIPS
The 2024 Brisbane Senior Metro Championships concluded today with several Aussie Olympians in the water. This meet is positioned ahead of next month’s Australian National Championships and the all-important Aussie Olympic Trials on the calendar for June.
Freestyle ace Sam Short dove in for multiple races, kicking off his campaign with a victory in the 400m free.
20-year-old Short fired off a time of 3:45.17 as the sole sub-3:50 swimmer of the field. Tommy Neill was next in line with a time of 3:51.43.
Short was the 2023 World Championships medalist in this event, firing off a time of 3:40.68 in a thriller of a race in Fukuoka where he beat Tunisian Olympic champion Ahmed Hanfaoui by just .02.
Neill got the upper hand in the men’s 200m freestyle here, however, with the 21-year-old Rackley swimmer logging 1:48.11. That sneaked to the wall .16 ahead of Short’s 1:48.27.
Short wrapped up his meet with a gold in the 800m free, clocking a time of 7:48.73.
After her impressive 100m freestyle victory on day 1, Rackley’s Meg Harris doubled up with gold in the women’s 50m free.
Harris produced an effort of 24.72 to beat the field by over a second, with Lily Price getting to the wall behind her in 25.74.
Harris owns a lifetime best of 24.29 in this splash n’ dash, a result she produced at last year’s Sydney Open. She also took the women’s 200m free event at 1:58.24 as the sole sub-2:00 performer in the race today.
Price went on to win the women’s 19&O 100m butterfly in a new Brisbane Record of 57.64. Opening in 26.96 and closing in 30.68, Price’s outing overtook the previous record legend Lisbeth (Libby) Lenton posted well over a decade ago in 2008.
Price’s heats time also beat the record, with Price posting 57.91 as the top seed in the earlier round. Her 57.64 represents a new lifetime best, slicing .14 from her prior career quickest.
21-year-old Price also topped the women’s 50m fly podium in a season-best 26.47, getting to the wall .22 ahead of Harris’ 27.69.
New mom Emily Seebohm raced in the heats of the women’s 100m back, putting up a solid swim of 1:02.36 before opting out of the final.
In her stead, Bronte Job grabbed the gold, logging 1:00.63 to set a new Brisbane Record. She held the prior mark at 1:01.37 from last year’s edition of this competition.
Job also got the edge over Seebohm in the 50m back, with the former posting 28.06 to the latter’s silver medal-worthy 29.31.
Seebohm also contested the women’s 200m back where the Olympic medalist representing St. Margaret’s hit 2:16.28 for the gold just months after giving birth to her first child.
Additional Notes
- Chandler’s Leah Neale topped the women’s 400m free in a time of 4:13.99, less than a second ahead of Yeronga Park’s open water ace Chelsea Gubecka. Gubecka settled for silver in 4:14.48 while Ella Ramsay also landed on the podium in 4:15.72 for bronze.
- Gubecka went on to claim gold in the 1500m free in a result of 16:38.97.
- Elloise Doolan established a new Brisbane Record en route to winning the women’s 200m fly. She logged 2:11.50 in the 17-year-old category, handily overtaking Gemma Cooney‘s old mark of 2:13.25 from 2017.
- 2016 Olympic silver medalist Maddie Groves raced in the women’s 19&O 200m fly event, posting 2:18.13 for silver. That sat exactly 5 seconds behind winner Laura Taylor who clocked 2:13.13 as the gold medalist.
- 16-year-old Joshua Conias hit a time of 22.69 as the winner of his age group’s 50m free. That erased his own Brisbane Record of 23.18 from January. The teen owns a PB of 22.69 from this year.
“Join us to witness the best Aussie swimmers in action at the 2024 NSW State Open Championships!
Only way to see them is to cheer them on live at SOPAC!”
From Swimming NSW Facebook page. I guess this is their way of saying there’ll be no stream…
They’ve removed the live streaming section from the event page entirely so it looks like you’re right.
2:16 2back after giving birth is seriously impressive
Really hope Seebohm can drop some time for trials. Being a mumma she has something else to swim for and prove now. I won’t be surprised if she finds some super human strength and muscles her way onto the team. Don’t count her out just yet!
Mens 4/200 will be the surprise of the Olympics
Harris is looking like she may best her PBs this year. Her 53.17 100 time here is very solid for her given her 50 speed isn’t there.
Campbell too has been consistent, but Harris seems on target for fast times.
Price’s swims recently have also been very strong, following her performance at last year’s trials.
Harris has been very good for Australia as a relay swimmer, but maybe, just maybe she is trying to step up.
Extremely tough as 3 of the top 5 women’s 100 free swimmers are Australians.
Unless she’s up for a 0.5sec PB drop, I think the 100 door is probably shut unless it’s an inordinately slow race at Trials.
50 ?? We probably forget she’s actually a Worlds bronze medallist from 2022. This one IS likely to be tough but she’s probably 3rd/4th seed with one contender (C1) who may be questionable over 3 rounds. Not too sure she’s a 24flat swimmer, let alone sub 24) but it may not take that to qualify.
Being questionable over three rounds will matter less at trials where there’s only two rounds.
not the first time he’s made that exact point
Fair point but the question of her capacity to back-up/replicate fast swims remains valid. If you cast your mind back to last year’s World Cup, she wasn’t always quicker heats to finals.
the only event she added time in was the 50 free in berlin, going 24.11 after a 24.10 in tyhe heats. not exactly inconsistent
Hence why I said trying, I personally think she needs more than a 1.0 PB to qualify.
I do not think .5 pb drop will be enough.
Seebohm promising times in the circumstances but don’t think she has enough time to get back to Olympic level unfortunately.
Looks like Groves is probably done internationally.
Promising times from Price. Dark horse for a 100 fly spot if she can drop a lot with a taper which she usually does.
Meg looking very solid.
Hoping to see some fast times in Sydney next weekend
Both Seebohm & Groves are little more than curiosities rather than serious factors for selection.
Impressive outing from Price and it probably puts her around “par” with Perkins as 3rd in the pecking order. I’m sceptical as to whether Perkins has much further “topside” so there is clearly scope for Price to move ahead of her. However, with Throssell showing sub57 form in Doha, and a CV as a repeat World level finallist in the event, I think she has a fairly strong hold on the 2nd qualifier position ….. unless she really drops the ball at Trials.
Concur re Harris’ 100 time.
Throssell tends to be slower at trials than the big meet (partial taper?) but this year she can’t afford to be anything but at her very best at trials.
I hoped she would but I think Seebohm will find there’s just not enough time. That being said she’s a tough lady will be interesting to see where she ends up.
C1 count her out at your own peril. Not sure what the go is with the guy continuing to jibe her on rounds honestly find it quite disrespectful.
Valid point but 57flat/57.1 will be enough to qualify and that’s still the best part of 0.5sec on Perkins and Price.
That’s some ridiculously fast in-season swimming from Sam Short…….
I don’t think that Sam will be Short of speed this summer