Which World Junior Championships Medalists Are Medals Contenders for 2020?

7th FINA World Junior Swimming Championships 2019

• 50-Meter Course
• Duna Arena, Budapest (Hungary)
• Pool swimming: Tuesday, August 20 – Sunday, August 25, 2019
• Meet site
• Live results

The FINA World Junior Championships have launched numerous future Olympic medalists onto the world stage since their inception. At the first version of the meet, then called FINA Youth World Championships, held in Rio de Janeiro in 2006, ten swimmers went on to medal for their countries at future Olympic Games. That 2006 meet included, among others, future gold medalists Camille Muffat of France, USA’s Tyler Clary (who competed as Scott Flowers until he changed his name at the age of 18), and Mireia Belmonte of Spain. Subsequent youth/junior meets featured future Olympic stars Caeleb Dressel (USA), Bronte Campbell (AUS), Gregorio Paltrinieri (ITA), Kosuke Hagino (JPN), Ryan Murphy (USA), Simone Manuel (USA), Mack Horton (AUS), Kyle Chalmers (AUS), and Penny Oleksiak (CAN). (A couple of athletes, like Lithuania’s Rūta Meilutytė and Canada’s Taylor Ruck, competed at FINA Juniors *after* winning Olympic medals, but those cases are rare.)

So who’s next?

Taking into consideration all the medalists from 2017 (who haven’t yet had the opportunity to swim at the Olympic Games) and 2019, the most obvious World-Juniors-medalist-to-Olympics-medalist picks are USA’s Regan Smith and Hungary’s Kristóf Milák. While neither competed at 2019 World Juniors, both of them swam times at 2017 World Juniors that would have scored in Rio in 2016. Moreover, both Smith and Milak swam at 2019 World Championships this summer and set World Records in their respective events, putting them in good stead for medals at 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo. Smith set World Records in both the 100 back (57.57) and 200 back (2:03.35) at Gwangju while Milak took down Michael Phelps’s mark in the 200 fly (1:50.73). His recent PB of 50.62 in the 100 fly would have earned him a silver medal in Rio.

2019 Swimmers of the Meet Andrei Minakov of Russia and Lani Pallister of Australia, and Croatia’s Franko Grgic emerged as the most promising talents from Budapest. Minakov won the 100 free and 100 fly and was runner-up in the 50 fly. His 100 fly time was only .11 off the silver medal-tying performance of Michael Phelps, László Cseh, and Chad le Clos (51.14) in 2016.  Furthermore, he won silver in the 100 fly at 2019 World Championships in Gwangju. His 100 free time in Budapest was 9/10 out of bronze-medal territory but only .05 off the leadoff split of Russia’s 4×100 free relay.

Grgic dominated the 800/1500 free races and set a World Junior Record in the latter by more than 10 seconds. His 1500 free time (14:46.09) is just over 5 seconds off the bronze-medal time from Rio (14:40.86). Pallister broke meet records in the 800/1500 free and wound up 7th/13th for the year in the respective events. As her compatriot Ariarne Titmus proved with a win over Katie Ledecky in the 400 free in Gwangju, on any given day, it is entirely possible to do the impossible and given Pallister’s progression over the last year, she may be on her way to a podium in Tokyo.

The entire cadre of 200 breaststrokers put on an impressive show in Budapest. Josh Matheny’s winning 2:09.40 set a Championships Record and was just 1.7 seconds off the third-place time from Rio. Japan’s Shoma Sato finished only .16 behind Matheny (2:09.56). On the women’s side, Russians Evgeniia Chikunova (2:24.03) and Anastasia Makarova (2:24.39) and Mei Ishihara of Japan (2:24.99) could all be medal contenders in Tokyo. Third place in Rio was 2:22.28.

Gretchen Walsh is inching her way into medal contention territory in the 50 free and 100 free. She won both events in Budapest going 24.71 and 53.74. Belarus’s Aliaksandra Herasimenia won bronze with 24.11 in the former and Sarah Sjöström placed third with 52.99 in the latter. Butterflyers Torri Huske of USA (57.71) and Anastasiya Shkurdai of Belarus (57.98) were 1-2 in the 100 fly, still 1.3 seconds away from Dana Vollmer’s bronze-medal time in Rio of 56.63, but they are both improving rapidly.

2017’s 50 free winner, Michael Andrew, has dropped his time to 21.46, which is .03 faster than Nathan Adrian’s bronze medal-winning performance in 2016. Luca Urlando, who won the 200 free and 200 fly at World Juniors, although not with best times, is a contender for medals in both events in 2020. His 1:46.51 in the 200 free is .1.28 seconds off the 1:45.23 it took to win bronze in Rio; his 1:53.84 is only .22 away from the 1:53.62 that Hungary’s Tamás Kenderesi swam to score the bronze in 2016. Apostolos Papastamos of Greece won the 400 IM with a World Junior Record of 4:11.93. Japan’s Daiya Seito went 4:09.71 for bronze in 2016.