USA Swimming Confirms Locations For 2023 U.S. Open & Winter Junior Championships

USA Swimming confirmed the locations of three key events on its 2023 domestic calendar Wednesday, revealing the hosts for the U.S. Open and the Winter Junior Championships.

2023 U.S. Open

The 2023 U.S. Open will take place in Greensboro, N.C., for the third consecutive year, with the event set to take place November 29-December 2.

The U.S. Open has been held at the Greensboro Aquatic Center dating back to 2021, with 2020 being contested as a multi-site event due to COVID-19 restrictions, and in 2019, the event was hosted in Atlanta.

The U.S. Open will remain a long course meet in 2023, though some have wondered if, given that it falls in the middle of the winter, it would make sense to have it be contested in short course yards (similar to the Winter National Championship meets that used to occupy the early December timeslot).

However, USA Swimming said the event will remain a LCM meet in order to “allow for more domestic long course opportunities to prepare for long course international competition” and to “yield to other entities who currently provide excellent short course opportunities”.

Winter Junior Championships

The Winter Championships – East will be held in Columbus, Ohio, while the West Championships will shift to Westmont, Ill., with both events scheduled for December 6-9.

The Winter Junior events have taken place in Greensboro (East) and Austin (West) in each of the last two years.

Columbus has hosted major USA Swimming events in the past, including a Pro Swim Series stop in 2018. The site has not been confirmed, but it will presumably be at Ohio State’s McCorkle Aquatic Pavilion.

Westmont was a last-minute replacement for Des Moines on the 2022 PSS calendar and will host another Pro Swim event this coming April at the city’s new FMC Aquatic Center.

There were preliminary discussions about adding a third site to Winter Juniors, but that won’t be the case this year. USA Swimming has said that the idea of adding a third site was more geared towards athlete opportunity and managing meet size rather than geographical concerns.

USA Swimming added that Winter Junior Championship meets are “significant investments” for them to provide competitive opportunities to the athletes, while the hosts are the ones that benefit financially (while also investing plenty of resources into volunteering, planning, etc.).

Nationals

As previously announced, USA Swimming will offer an additional National Championship-esque meet (TYR Pro Championships) the week prior to Junior Nationals in late July/early August in addition to the National Championship competition that will serve as the qualifier for the World Championships one month prior.

  • June 27-July 1 – Phillips 66 National Championships – Indianapolis, Ind. (World Championship qualifier)
  • July 26-29 – TYR Pro Championships – Irvine, Calif.
  • July 31-August 4 – Speedo Junior National Championships – Mission Viejo, Calif.

USA Swimming said that the extra competition was made in order to offer more long course opportunities less than one year out from the Olympic Trials.

“This is another case of the three-year quad creating scheduling challenges while we look to create competitive opportunities for all,” a USA Swimming spokesperson said.

Futures Championships

As reported in mid-October, there will be five sites for the Futures Championships in 2023 compared to the usual four we’ve seen in years past.

The 2023 Futures Championship meets will be held in the following locations, all taking place from July 26-29, 2023:

  • Region 1 – Richmond, Virginia – SwimRVA
  • Region 2 – Ocala, Florida – Florida Aquatics Swimming & Training (FAST)
  • Region 3 – West Fargo, North Dakota – Hulbert Aquatic Center
  • Region 4 – San Antonio, Texas – Bill Walker Pool
  • Region 5 – Sacramento, California – North Natomas Aquatic Center

USA Swimming has discussed adding 18 & Under Spring Cup events in 2024 to provide more long course opportunities at the Futures level, but hasn’t made any decisions as of yet.

Updated 2023 USA Swimming Domestic Calendar

Date  Competition  Location
Jan. 11-14  TYR Pro Swim Series  Knoxville, Tenn.
March 1-4  TYR Pro Swim Series  Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
 April 12-15  TYR Pro Swim Series  Westmont, Ill.
 April 21-23  Open Water Nationals  Sarasota, Fla.
 May 17-20  TYR Pro Swim Series  Mission Viejo, Calif.
 June 27-July 1  Phillips 66 National Championships  Indianapolis, Ind.
 July 26-29  TYR Pro Championships  Irvine, Calif.
 July 26-29  Futures Championships  Ocala, Fla.
 July 26-29  Futures Championships  West Fargo, N.D.
 July 26-29  Futures Championships  San Antonio, Texas
 July 26-29  Futures Championships  Richmond, Va.
 July 26-29  Futures Championships  Sacramento, Calif.
 July 31-Aug. 4  Speedo Junior National Championships  Irvine, Calif.
 Nov. 29-Dec. 2  Toyota U.S. Open  Greensboro, N.C.
 Dec. 6-9  Speedo Winter Junior Championships (East)  Columbus, Ohio
 Dec. 6-9  Speedo Winter Junior Championships (West)  Westmont, Ill.

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Rebecca
11 months ago

Does anyone have insight as to why USA Swimming has not released the 2023 Winter Juniors cuts yet? This is very frustrating for swimmers finishing up the short course season and wanting to make cut time in SCY, The long course season is so short and in our LSC swimmers have few opportunities to practice in 50 meter pools so qualifying in LCM is much tougher. Last year the Winter Junior cuts were released in early February!

Brenda Rachel
1 year ago

Do you have room for international clubs
participating? Or how do you deal with American citizens who are leaving aboard and would like to take part?

Go2024
1 year ago

What about sectionals? I don’t see any listed

MIKE IN DALLAS
1 year ago

Having Winter Junior Championships in two cities only 365 miles apart makes NO sense to me. If this is supposed to attract the best of our younger swimmers, WHY oh why have the two host cities so close geographically? To me, it will reduce the overall quality of the participant pool, and disadvantage those who’ll need to travel 1500+ miles to get there.

Holy
1 year ago

Petition to make Juniors cuts faster again and combine the meets to make real yards Junior Nationals so we can watch Williamson v. Heilman v. Diehl?

OTS
Reply to  Holy
1 year ago

I think the challenge for this is so many states have high school swimming as a winter sport, and for those states where it is a fall sport, the timing makes it a complicated double-taper. I believe high school swimming is an important part of the swimming experience for many – it is “fun” and brings a team element unlike what most experience in club swimming. Keep the long course meet the faster nationals and we can all wait for NCAA’s to see folks square off head-to-head in SCY

Western Swimmer
1 year ago

Illinois is considered “west”? I live in the “West” and I couldn’t find even one person in a thousand that wants to got to Illinois. The next time membership and revenue and meet attendance drop stories happen at the national, state, county, LSC, etc level can we please refer back to reports like this?

Admin
Reply to  Western Swimmer
1 year ago

Sigh, don’t know how many times I have to repost this, but here we go again:

Kaskaskia, Illinois is west of the Mississippi River, and c. 1818 was the capital of the Illinois Territory (previously part of the Northwest Territory) and, with a population north of 7,000 at the time, was for a time the largest city in the US that is currently West of the Mississippi River. Its status in the early Western US is why King Louis XV gifted them a big Bell in 1741, that is known as the “Liberty Bell of the West.”

As you’re aware, St. Louis at the time was the Gateway to the West, implying that West of the Mississippi was the Western… Read more »

Admin
Reply to  Braden Keith
1 year ago

And that doesn’t even get into the name WESTmont. At time of naming, it was the highest point on the Burlington-Northern Railroad WEST of Chicago. Hence WEST and MONT. 748 feet of western mountain elevation.

It’s basically the start of the Rockies.

Dan
Reply to  Braden Keith
1 year ago

The term “mid-West” was coined for a reason. It’s west of the Mississippi, but clearly not truly a western state. I wonder how many square miles of US land is west of Westmont, Illinois and how much land is east?

Admin
Reply to  Dan
1 year ago

Okay but how much population is west of Westmont vs. East of it?

Dan
Reply to  Braden Keith
1 year ago

Seems to me the factor that determines east/west should be physical location in relation to the two coast of the USA, not population distribution.

Admin
Reply to  Dan
1 year ago

All kidding aside, when these facilities are built, they’re assured of a certain status within the rotation. Even if that’s a wink-and-nudge agreement, it’s understood.

Illinois is really neither east nor west in the modern United States, but FMC has to host something.

My guess is that limited California/Oregon/Washington participation in Winter Juniors anyway doesn’t really motivate anyone to move meets out there. Plus, they’re not building new facilities to get the new handshake agreements for hosting.

All that set aside, California gets the big summer meets often. So you’ve gotta give the Midwest folks something close by sometimes. At the least, Chicago is really easy to get to from anywhere in the country. I’d rather a 4 hour direct… Read more »

Dan
Reply to  Braden Keith
1 year ago

Agreed on the ease of travel to Chicago; but why does FMC “have” to host something? I do think FMC is a great spot for ProSeries; but juniors just seems way too big. Maybe teams will opt out next year and make things more manageable; but that’s not exactly a good solution to the problems

PonyPunch
1 year ago

Whoever decided to have the Bill Walker pool/JD Natatorium be a host site for Futures in JULY(!!!) needs to be fired immediately. Like, today.

Andrew
1 year ago

GAC is top 3 pool in country imo

About James Sutherland

James Sutherland

James swam five years at Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ontario, specializing in the 200 free, back and IM. He finished up his collegiate swimming career in 2018, graduating with a bachelor's degree in economics. In 2019 he completed his graduate degree in sports journalism. Prior to going to Laurentian, James swam …

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