SwimSwam Rewind: 30 Years of NCAA Championship Swimming Evolution

With the world shutting down, we’re reaching into our archives and pulling some of our favorite stories from the SwimSwam print edition to share online. If you’d like to read more of this kind of story, you can subscribe to get a print (and digital) version of SwimSwam Magazine here. This story was originally published in the 2019 Fall edition of SwimSwam Magazine.

1989 was a long time ago. George H.W. Bush was president. The Soviet Union still existed, and the Berlin Wall was still standing. There was no platform diving at the NCAA Championships. The previous year’s Olympic Games featured the inaugural 50-meter freestyle. (Matt Biondi won the men’s version in a world-record time of 22.14, while Kristin Otto won the women’s version.)

None of the competitors in the 2019 NCAA Championships was born yet, but Eddie Reese was still the head coach at Texas and won the men’s title that year. I guess some things never change.

1989 is also the oldest year that SwimSwam has both the men’s and the women’s results, so I thought it might be interesting to see how much has changed in the past 30 years. We know the sport has gotten a lot faster any way you look at it.

And — spoiler alert! — every 2019 winner would have beaten the 1989 winner. That’s not particularly surprising. But how would the 1989 participants have fared? Would some have done better than others? Would anyone have even scored?

Let’s start with the men.

2019 last place time is listed for events where 1989 winner would have been last in 2019.

** – Records set that year.

One of the most telling events for me here was the men’s 100 back. The field was incredible. David Berkoff (Olympic gold medalist) won with a new NCAA record; Jeff Rouse (Olympic gold medalist) and Mel Stewart (Olympic gold medalist) completed the podium.

The rest of the finalists were Andy Gill (finished third at the U.S. Olympic Trials in the 100-meter back, twice), Martin Zubero (Olympic gold medalist), Rick Gould, Gary Anderson (Olympian), and Jay Mortenson (Olympic gold medalist).

All in all, six Olympians who had earned 13 medals, nine of them gold. The winning time, by the way, was 47.02, a record at the time. That time would have finished 37th this year.

My, have times changed.

Overall, we can divide all the event winners into three groups: those who scored, those who were kind of close to scoring, and those who weren’t even close.

The scoring events were the 500 free and the 1650 free, in which Artur Wojdat’s 4:12.24 and Mariusz Podkoscielny‘s 14:38.09 both would’ve finished fifth this year.

The kind of close events were the 400 IM and the 200 free, in which David Wharton’s 3:44.69 and Wojdat’s 1:33.82 would have finished 22nd and 23rd. Kind of close!

The next-highest finish of all the individual events would’ve been 33rd (the 100 free, Shaun Jordan’s 42.98), with the 100 fly (Mortenson’s 47.14) good for second to last and the 200 back (Jeff Rouse, 1:44.87) finishing last.

It’s an interesting distribution. The events that we kind of consider most difficult (the 500/1650 free, the 400 IM) are the ones that have aged the best. Only one of the winning times, Podkoscielny’s mile, would make 2019’s A cut (though Wojdat’s 500 free was only 0.02 seconds off). All the rest would’ve made the B cut (though some not by much).

Of course, not every 1989 swim was the best swim at that time. Looking back even further, we can see how the 1989 records would have fared against the 2019 meet. The record-holder in the short freestyles at the time was Biondi. His records of 19.15, 41.80, and 1:33.03 would have finished tied for ninth, ninth, and 17th. That’s a testament to how great those swims were — the 41.80 would have been an A cut this year.

Of course, that’s not to say that Pablo Morales wasn’t a great butterflyer, even though his records at the time would have been good for only 37th in the 100 and 23rd in the 200 this year. Time flies.

How about the women?

2019 last place time is listed for events where 1989 winner would have been last in 2019.

** – Records set that year.

Just like the men, two women’s champions would have scored, two would have come very close, and the rest were pretty far back.

Leigh Ann Fetter set the 50-free mark that year with a 22.05, good for 12th, and Erika Hansen won the mile in 16:00.04, which would’ve finished 14th this year.

The kind of close events for the women were actually very, very close. Mitzi Kremer won the 200 free (1:44.78) and 500 free (4:39.18) that year, and both would’ve been 17th this year.

The next-highest finish would’ve been 28th (the 100 free, Fetter’s 48.68), then a couple more in the 30s. But most would have been last or close to it this year.

Not a single winning time that year would’ve made an A cut in 2019, and three — the 100 and 200 back, swept by Kristen Linehan in 54.98 and 1:57.89, and the 100 breast, won by Stephanie Zunich in 1:02.10 — wouldn’t have even made a B cut.

Just like with the men, the 500 free and 1650 free were some of the best-performing events 30 years later. And actually, I’m not even done with those two quite yet.

The women’s record board from 1989 had some legendary names on it. Some of those records were already quite old at the time, and five would’ve scored at the 2019 Championships. Sippy Woodhead‘s 200 free (a 1:44.10 from 1979) would have finished 12th. Tracy Caulkins’ 400 IM (a 4:04.63 from 1981) and Mary T. Meagher‘s 200 fly (a 1:52.99 from the same year, good for an A cut 38 years later) would have finished seventh this year. Caulkins actually even had one better: Her 500 free from 1979 (a 4:36.25) would’ve finished sixth and still been good for an A cut a full 40 years later!

And last but not least is Janet Evans. Her mile record at the time, 15:44.98, would’ve been third this year, just a few tenths behind Ohio State’s Molly Kowal.

So what can we conclude?

The sport has improved tremendously across the board, but not consistently. The distance freestyle times from 30 years ago wouldn’t have won this year, but they would have scored. The shorter freestyles were a little worse, but still in the ballpark.

But the strokes are practically night and day. Some of the times that would’ve been good for an NCAA title, or even an NCAA record, have slowly drifted back to being just good college times — or even just good high school times. One of the 1989 records (Betsy Mitchell’s 100 back in 53.98) wouldn’t even be a B cut this year.

This can be seen more dramatically in the medley relays. All four winning times would have finished last this year — and, if we ignore the Harvard men’s 400 medley relay, an outlier this year, by a significant margin.

It’s not even necessarily that the freestyle relays did particularly well — the women’s 200 freestyle relay broke the NCAA record in 1989 and would’ve finished 16th this year, the only relay out of 10 that would have scored. But that’s noticeably better than the strokes.