U.S. Olympic Trials: The “Junior Olympic Team”; Halfway Point

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Feature by David Rieder

OMAHA, Nebraska, June 29. HALF of the U.S. Olympic team has already been decided during the course of the first four days of Trials in Omaha. This team shapes up to be a very experienced squad, especially on the men's side. With that in mind, we decided to take a look at who has shown themselves to be the next batch of great American swimmers at these Trials.

Our “Junior Olympic team” consists only of athletes with one or more years of college eligibility remaining. Certainly, such criteria cannot perfectly distinguish between veterans and inexperienced swimmers. For example, Allison Schmitt still has a year of NCAA eligibility left, while Chloe Sutton decided to go pro in December, 2009. Still, the distinction between professional and amateur remains the biggest in swimming.

For our Junior Olympic team, we considered only the last time an athlete swam. For places one through eight, that means their finals time. For ninth through 16th, their semi-final time and so on. The first number listed by each athlete represents their place in the amateur rankings, while the second number shows the place each actually finished.

Men's 400 IM
1. (4) Andrew Gemmell, 4:16.07
2. (5) Michael Weiss, 4:16.31

Men's 400 Free
1. (5) Ryan Feeley, 3:49.25
2. (6) Connor Jaeger, 3:49.55

Women's 400 IM
1. (1) Elizabeth Beisel, 4:31.74
2. (2) Caitlin Leverenz, 4:34.43

Women's 100 Fly
1. (4) Kelsey Floyd, 58.22
2. (8) Carolina McElhany, 58.77

Men's 100 Breast
1. (3) Kevin Cordes, 1:00.55
2. (11) Nicolas Fink, 1:01.14

Women's 400 Free
1. (1) Allison Schmitt, 4:02.84
2. (3) Katie Ledecky, 4:05.00

Men's 200 Free
1. (10) Michael Wynalda, 1:48.38
2. (12) Clay Youngquist, 1:48.42

Women's 100 Back
1. (1) Missy Franklin, 58.85
2. (2) Rachel Bootsma, 59.49

Men's 100 Back
1. (6) Ryan Murphy, 53.92
2. (8) Jack Conger, 54.63

Women's 100 Breast
1. (1) Breeja Larson, 1:05.92
2. (4) Ellyn Baumgardner, 1:07.19

Women's 200 Free
1. (1) Allison Schmitt, 1:54.40
2. (2) Missy Franklin, 1:56.79

Men's 200 Fly
1. (6) Dakota Hodgson, 1:58.07
2. (8) Michael Flach, 1:59.43

Women's 200 IM
1. (1) Caitlin Leverenz, 2:10.22
2. (3) Elizabeth Pelton, 2:11.55

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