Sjostrom Fires Off Two World-Ranked Swims During Day 1 Prelims of 2015 Sette Colli Trophy

The 52nd annual Settecolli Internazionali d’Italia di Nuoto (2015 Sette Colli Trophy) kicked off with its first prelims session this morning and already some swift times have been thrown down.  Primarily by Sweden’s sprint star Sarah Sjostrom, who competed in both the 100m butterfly and 50m freestyle events.

Full Results

Sjostrom’s races were back-to-back, but the timing did not faze the 21-year-old, who swam away with the top seed in both. For the 100m butterfly, Sjostrom fired off the 6th-fastest time in the world, clocking a smooth 57.72 to come out as the only swimmer under the 58-point on the morning.  Then, in the 50m freestyle splash n’ dash, Sjostrom also put her dominance on display, registering a speedy 24.44 to also make her the only swimmer to dip beneath the 25-point threshold in the prelims of the event.  Her performance knocked two tenths off of her previous season best of 24.64 from May’s Bergen Swim Festival and also now moves Sjostrom up to 6th in the world rankings.

Note, Inge Dekker (NED), was listed on the psych sheets, but did not swim the 50m free this morning.  Dekker has pointed to some back injury issues in her social media accounts prior to the meet, per below:

While the other events saw solid performances, most competitors played it safe for their morning swims and may be saving their potential fireworks for the evening session.  Perhaps some played it a little too safely, as both Italy’s Marco Orsi and Trinidad and Tobago’s George Bovell, both typically seen as dangerous threats in the 50m freestyle, failed to make it to the A-Final of the event, finishing in 9th and 10th place, respectively.

Finals continue tonight, beginning at 6pm local time/Noon Eastern.