Mariah Denigan, Ivan Puskovitch Lead Team USA for Pan Pacs Open Water
Paris Olympians Mariah Denigan and Ivan Puskovitch lead an eight-strong U.S. team for the open water event at the 2026 Pan Pacific Championships.
Qualification for the 10K race at this summer’s meet in Irvine occurred via U.S. Open Water Nationals and World Cup meets this spring in Europe. Puskovitch and Denigan each swept the 10k, 5k and 3k knockout titles at Nationals in April.
Denigan is joined by fellow Olympian Ashley Twichell, still one of the nation’s best swimmers in this second chapter of her career in her 30s, as well as Brinkleigh Hansen and Becca Mann.
The men’s roster comprises Puskovitch, Dylan Gravley, Joey Tepper and Joshua Brown.
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Denigan represented the U.S at the Paris Olympics in 2024. She finished 16th, a spot behind countrywoman Katie Grimes. She finished 14th at the World Championships in 2025, sixth in 2024, eighth in 2023 and 15th in her first Worlds debut in 2022. The former Indiana University standout is now training at Ohio State.
Denigan won the 10K race at Nationals in Sarasota last month, followed by Hansen, Twichell and Mann. Puskovitch edged Tepper in the men’s race, with Tepper fourth and Brown fifth.
Twichell, 36, placed seventh at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021. She’s a two-time World Championships gold medalist over shorter distances and won the 2023 Pan American Games. She finished fourth at the 2018 Pan Pacs in Japan. She has long been a fixture on the world circuit for the U.S., competing at Worlds in 2019 (fifth) and 2017 (10th).
Mann’s appearance comes more than a decade after her bow on the international stage as a precocious teenager. She finished eighth in the 10K at the World Championships all the way back in 2013, then was 14th in 2015.
Hansen is in that youthful role now. The 16-year-old from Florida won the 5k World Junior title in 2024. She made her first global competition on the senior side in 2025, finishing 24th in Singapore.
Puskovitch has become the standard bearer for the American men’s program. The only man to qualify for the Paris Olympics in the event, he placed 19th there. He was 14th at Worlds in 2024.
The men’s team is shorter on experience, but not markedly so. Gravley has competed at Worlds on two occasions, the Arizona State grad placing 13th in 2022 and 22nd in 2025. Tepper, a graduate of the University of Minnesota, was 12th at Worlds in 2025 and 36th in 2023.
Brown is the new face, a product of Sandpipers of Nevada who just finished his senior year at Michigan.