It took 17-year-old Simone Manuel to break Natalie Coughlin’s three-year old American Record in the 100 freestyle. Manuel swam a 46.83 in prelims at the NASA Junior National Championship Cup, to break the previous 46.84 standard set by Natalie Coughlin at Short Course Nationals in 2011.
The U.S. Open and NCAA Records still belong to Arianna Vanderpool-Wallace, who was a 46.61 at SEC’s in 2012 representing Auburn; Vanderpool-Wallace is from the Bahamas. Manuel’s swim ranks her as the second-fastest swimmer of all-time in the event, and is the fifth-fastest performance in its history as well.
That swim by Manuel was also a new National Age Group Record, breaking her previous best time of 47.09 from NCSA Junior Nationals just a week ago, also in Florida. Manuel set the tone of the race early, at 22.54 to the feet on the first 50, and came home very strong in 24.29 to set the record.
Manuel has exploded onto the international scene last summer when she finished 2nd in the 50 freestyle and 3rd in the 100 freestyle at World Championship Trials, earning her a berth to the World Championships. Â She went onto Worlds in Barcelona to win gold in the 4×100 FR-R, and placed 7th in the 50 freestyle individually.
She is also famously known for anchoring the 200 mixed medley relay at the 2013 Mutual of Omaha Duel in the Pool to a win, which sealed a victory for Team USA overall.
Manuel swims for First Colony Swim Team out of Sugar Land, Texas. Finals of the meet will begin at 6PM EST tonight. The meet started on Wednesday and will end tonight in Clearwater, Florida.
Maybe, just maybe she could be the challenger to Cate Campbell come Rio!
WOW!! Great job and what a bright future–she’s now proven herself both LCM and SCM internationally, as well as SCY! Coughlin is now focusing on the 50 and 100 free and still going strong; split 52.9 on the relay at Worlds last summer, and was arguably slightly better at SCY at her peak, I’d like to see her take a crack at getting the record back to further motivate Manuel. But I don’t think there are any big SCY meets left this year for them to meet in until possibly nationals later this fall.
46.83!
😯
But not so surprised.
She’s a sprint diamond.
The US female sprint specialist USA is waiting since Dara Torres and Jenny Thompson.
Congrats Simone!
LIVE WEBCAST OF THE MEET WITH MICHAEL ANDREW AND SIMONE MANUEL HERE!
https://new.livestream.com/floridaswimnetwork3/NASAjrnats
What meet did Coughlin set the previous Anerican record? SC nationals in December 2011 were actually held in LCM due to trials only 6 months away.
That year the Cal women went to a short course invitational in Athens while the Cal men went to December nationals (long course) in Atlanta.
Vanderpool-Wallace is from the Bahamas. Not Jamaica. At least she represents Bahamas.
yea she swam 47.0 last week and this article has several typos
but fantastic swim!!
Fastswimresults.com
After her 47.0 at NCSAs I knew she could do it, but I wasn’t expecting it until next year in college!!! Congrats to her. It will be fun to see the results next year after her, Lia Neal, Maddy Schaefer, Lindsey Engel, and possibly Janet Hu (who might not focus on the sprints after her awesome 200 fly + IM) all get to train together. Stanford will do some crazy things!!!!