2024 SOUTH AFRICAN NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS (OLYMPIC TRIALS)
- Monday, April 8th – Saturday, April 13th
- Newton Park Swimming Pool, Gqeberha, South Africa
- LCM (50m)
- SwimSwam Preview
- Day 1 Recap
- Results
The 2024 South African National Championships (Olympic Trials) rolled into its second day from Gpeberha with swimmers vying for spots on the Paris 2024 roster.
The women’s 100m free field came up short today, as winner Aimee Canny clocked the fastest time in 54.65.
The 20-year-old Virginia swimmer split 24.46/28.19 to beat national record holder Erin Gallagher en route to topping the podium.
25-year-old Gallagher notched 54.88 as the runner-up, adding this silver to her 50m fly national record-setting gold from last night. Caitlin De Lange, 20, rounded out this 1free podium in 55.92.
Canny’s time tonight fell just .05 shy of the 54.60 personal best she established at the 2023 World Championships while Gallagher’s South African standard remains at the 54.23 put up at the 2022 Commonwealth Games.
The World Aquatics Olympic Qualification Time sits at a speedy 53.61 while the ‘B’ cut is 53.88.
For the men, it was 19-year-old Pieter Coetze who grabbed the 100m free gold.
Coetze earned a winning result of 49.12 to out-touch 31-year-old Chad Le Clos‘s time of 49.34. Guy Brooks hit 49.42 to also land on the podium.
Coetze won 50m back gold last night as a follow-up to the 200m back bronze he produced at this year’s World Championships.
The men’s 200m fly heats saw top 2 performers Matt Sates and Chad Le Clos take it easy. The former logged 2:02.13 to the latter’s 2:03.04.
Come tonight’s final, Le Clos was absent, having withdrawn from the main event.
In his stead, there was clear water for Sates, with the 20-year-old posting a time of 1:56.99. That got the former Georgia Bulldog to the wall over 6 seconds ahead of his competitors.
Sates time fell short of the 1:55.78 ‘A’ cut needed for Paris, although his result did check in as the 7th-quickest performance of his career. He’s been as swift as 1:55.25 from the 2023 World Aquatics Swimming World Cup.
Le Clos owns a season-best of 1:56.65 from December’s South African World Trials.
Additional Notes
- Dune Coetzee, a Georgia Bulldog, beat the women’s 200m fly field by over 3 seconds, hitting 2:13.97 as the gold medalist. Her best time remains at the 2:10.89 registered at the 2019 edition of this competition.
