2019 WOMEN’S Division I NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Wednesday, March 20th – Saturday, March 23rd
- Lee & Joe Jamail Texas Swimming Center — Austin, Texas
- Prelims 9 a.m./Finals 5 p.m. (Central Time)
- Championship Central
- Psych Sheet
- Live Results
- Full livestream schedule
The Stanford Cardinal picked up their first event win of the 2019 Women’s Division I NCAA Championships Wednesday night, throwing down a new pool record in 6:47.22.
Katie Drabot led off in 1:43.99, followed by Ella Eastin with a stellar 1:41.03, then Taylor Ruck – in her first NCAA Championship swim – broke the race open in a blazing fast 1:39.83, and Brooke Forde anchored in 1:42.37.
However, Forde’s time was “to the foot,” as she accidentally tacked an extra 50 onto the end of her swim. Luckily, she was anchoring and Stanford had a multi-second lead, so it didn’t affect the race outcome. Impressively, however, Forde’s best time in a (flat start) 200 freestyle is 1:44.68, and her relay split last year was 1:42.94. Even with the relay start, the fact that she was over two seconds under her best time – to the foot – bodes well for her performance this week. Her splits were 24.06/25.35/25.94/27.02/27.58 (the final one being from our watch).
“I’d like to say it was a victory lap,” Forde said in a post-race interview.
The team laughed it off right away – we’ve all been there, or at least been nervous about being there.
Watch the relay, plus the bonus 50, below:
Hilarious photo of the reaction to Forde from the Stanford sideline:
https://twitter.com/stanfordwswim/status/1108767927740911616
is that not a DQ?
The only thing you could call her on would be delay of meet, and since it was the final heat, that’s not going to happen.
IIRC, freestyle doesn’t specify a body part that has to hit the wall first, unlike the other strokes.
WR 250 split?
I am always blown away at how tall ruck is. That picture makes her look like a senior group swimmer in a relay with age groupers.
I am excited to see her that fast, NCAAs are always so exciting
Will you guys be recording all of the finals race videos this week?
Uh oh for Tennessee
Why dump on Tennessee? Tennessee is really good and almost scored. It is an honor just to compete at NCAAs.
Clearly the stress of two big emotional meets in a 4 week span was detrimental to the Lady Vols. Can’t expect them to get emotionally ready for two big meets so close together.
Victory Lap!
Ruck looks like she’s in amazing form here. I’m excited for this week.
Yea, it looks like she brought her “A” game. If so, it should be fun to watch.