What Happened in Heat Four of the 200 Fly?

by Madeline Folsom 17

March 29th, 2025 College, News

2025 Men’s NCAA Swimming and Diving Championships

Heat four of the men’s 200 fly preliminaries had an odd technical malfunction that is led to the heat being re-swum before the three-way 200 back swim-off.

The starter reportedly fumbled over the buttons, leading to the buzzer going off directly after the “take your mark” with no pause in between. This led to lane seven Haakon Naughton not starting with the rest of the field, but rather starting multiple seconds behind, as seen in this video.

There will be a re swim of heat 4 of the 200 fly at 11:30 pic.twitter.com/cDj769cLCW

— SwimSwam (@swimswamnews) March 29, 2025


This was the first circle seeded heat of the event, and featured numerous athletes who are expected to make the final:

List of Swimmers and How Far they Went the First Time

  1. Tomer Frankel, Indiana- 75 yards
  2. Jacob Johnson, Minnesota- 35 yards
  3. Seb Lunak, UNC- 50 yards
  4. Krzysztof Chmielewski, USC- 30 yards
  5. Dare Rose, Cal- 25 yards
  6. Frank Applebaum, Cal- 50 yards
  7. Haakon Naughton, Arizona- 25 yards
  8. Stephen Hitchcock, Georgia- 25 yards

This heat is absolutely crucial to Cal’s chances as Rose and Applebaum are their only two potential scorers in the event. If they want to keep their hopes of winning the National Team Title alive, they need to score highly.

Heat Four Results:

  1. Krzysztof Chmielewski (USC)- 1:39.09
  2. Dare Rose (Cal)- 1:39.78
  3. Haakon Naughton (Arizona)- 1:40.24
  4. Frank Applebaum (Cal)- 1:40.61
  5. Jacob Johnson (Minnesota)- 1:40.86
  6. Stephen Hitchcock (Georgia)- 1:41.22
  7. Tomer Frankel (Indiana)/Seb Lunak (UNC)- 1:41.29

Updated Top 16

  1. Luca Urlando (Georgia)- 1:37.35
  2. Ilya Kharun (ASU)- 1:38.81
  3. Krzysztof Chmielewski (USC)- 1:39.09
  4. Martin Espernberger (Tennessee)- 1:39.61
  5. Colin Geer (Michigan)- 1:39.65
  6. Dare Rose (California)- 1:39.78
  7. Jake Magahey (Georgia)- 1:39.90
  8. Andrei Minakov (Stanford)- 1:39.93
  9. Bjoern Kammann (Tennessee)- 1:39.95
  10. Haakon Naughton (Arizona)- 1:40.24
  11. Logan Robinson (FSU)- 1:40.51
  12. Frank Applebaum (Cal)- 1:40.61
  13. Gal Groumi (Michigan)- 1:40.72
  14. Jacob Johnson (Minnesota)/Cooper Lucas (Texas)- 1:40.86
  15. Gibson Holmes (Stanford)- 1:40.89

In This Story

17
Leave a Reply

Subscribe
Notify of

17 Comments
newest
oldest most voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Simple solution
2 days ago

Why on earth aren’t recall ropes used?

swimgeek
Reply to  Simple solution
2 days ago

Think about the amount of speed and force with which Jordan Crooks hits the 12.5-yard mark — and then drop a rope across his path for him to be clothes-lined by … and that’s why we don’t use a “recall rope” anymore.

Flatlander
2 days ago

Unacceptable at this level. The timers and lane officials stood around looking confused and geriatric. False starts are not uncommon and they should’ve had their systems dialed. There should be an underwater buzzer to sound and the lane judges should know exactly what to do.

It probably didn’t change much in the big scheme of things, but the officials looked confused and inept. Bummer for all of these boys who were ready to rock ‘n’ roll.

BR32
Reply to  Flatlander
2 days ago

Agreed it’s absurd

Admin
Reply to  Flatlander
2 days ago

False starts aren’t uncommon, but they don’t stop races for false starts anymore.

lapswimspecialist
Reply to  Flatlander
2 days ago

I agree. This is something I’d see at a club meet with 8 and unders racing 25s…

BR32
2 days ago

That’s unacceptable

MarshMadness
2 days ago

How do you let somebody swim 75 yards? And does he not notice everyone else has gotten out?

Isaac
Reply to  MarshMadness
2 days ago

The swimmers were probably too scared to stop him. They could get beat up lol

H2OPolo
Reply to  MarshMadness
2 days ago

Frankel was probably a B Finalist without that situation. Could be huge points in final tally. Should have waited 30 minutes at least to re run the heat. Cal got hurt too.

Jeff K
2 days ago

Thank Goodness this didn’t happen to Mr. Cooks. His Gumbo might have burned!!!

IU Swammer
2 days ago

Really glad they gave the swimmers lots of time before making them go again.

WaterAce
2 days ago

The two swimmers that went the farthest took dead last, that would piss me off so much.

Isaac
Reply to  WaterAce
2 days ago

The were seeded low though tbf. Also Tomer missed his taper.

WaterAce
2 days ago

You’d think they’d have the PA or a buzzer to tell swimmers to stop, instead of having refs trying to get their attention

swimgeek
Reply to  WaterAce
2 days ago

The starter holds down the button and it repeatedly beeps. The problem is the swimmers have their heads in the water… I like the idea of an in-water sound or light system.

Mad Hater
Reply to  swimgeek
1 day ago

The starter was designed decades ago to repeatedly beep. It has never been hugely successful, but no one seems to care enough to do anything about it.

Last edited 1 day ago by Mad Hater