Speedo Winter Juniors East: Thomas Heilman Doubles in 200 IM, 50 Free; Female Speed Show in 50 Free Tie

Speedo Winter Juniors East: Thomas Heilman Wins 200 IM, 50 Free on Second Night
Following a lifetime-best performance leading off his club’s 800 freestyle relay Wednesday evening, Thomas Heilman of Cavalier Aquatic Club kicked off his individual slate of events at the eastern site of Speedo Junior Nationals in Greensboro, N.C., with strong swims in both the 200 IM and 50 free, with both swims resulting in comfortable victories.
Heilman started out with a dominant win in the medley, recording a mark of 1:41.26 to take the win by more than two seconds. Lakeside’s Thomas Mercer was within a second of Heilman for the first 150 yards, but Heilman’s 24.16 closing split was enough to get the job done with a time of 1:41.26. After cruising in prelims with the seventh-best time, almost missing the cut for the A-final, Heilman edged his previous best time of 1:41.41.
Gwinnett Aquatic Club’s Baylor Stanton closed well to touch second in 1:43.45, but he was disqualified. That left Mercer in second place in 1:43.51, with Ian Stutts of Marlins of Raleigh third in 1:45.59.
Barely 15 minutes later, Heilman returned to the blocks to dominate the 50 free, clocking 19.26 to come up just two hundredths short of his best time in 19.26, beating out Greensboro Swim Association’s Albert Smelzer (19.70) and Huntsville Swim Association’s Luke Bedsole (19.71).
At the end of the session, Heilman came back to post a 43.95 butterfly split as part of Cavalier Aquatics’ 400 medley relay. At last year’s NCAA Championships, that split was surpassed by only three swimmers: Arizona State’s Ilya Kharun, NC State’s Luke Miller and Stanford’s Andrei Minakov. The effort positioned Heilman to go after sizzling times in the butterfly events over the meet’s final two days.
The other men’s individual event, the 500 free, went to Area Tallahassee’s Ethan Ekk in an exciting finish. Ekk trailed Bolles’ Xavier Sohovich for much of the race while swimming even with Laker Swim’s Ryan Erisman, but Ekk accelerated and took the lead shortly after the 400-yard mark. He ended up winning in 4:15.20, a quarter-second clear of the field. Sohovich took second in 4:15.46, three hundredths ahead of Ersiman (4:15.49). Erisman ended up with the day’s top overall time after going 4:14.50 in prelims.
On the women’s side, there was a tie in the women’s 50 free, as Laker Swim’s Rylee Erisman and Fishers Area’s Julia Mishler swam equal times of 21.62. Erisman, 15, is the second-fastest swimmer ever in the 15-16 age group, behind only Claire Curzan’s 21.50, and she was just one hundredth off her best time here. Lakeside’s Charlotte Crush took third in 22.04.
Audrey Derivaux was back in national-level racing after a huge summer in which she qualified for the Olympic Trials final of the 400-meter IM as a 14-year-old before winning both butterfly event at the Junior Pan Pacific Championships. Now 15, the Jersey Wahoos swimmer was the clear winner in the 200 IM. Overcoming a relatively slow breaststroke leg, Derivaux pulled away to win in 1:55.24, ahead of SwimMAC Carolina’s Elle Scott (1:56.25) and Carmel’s Molly Sweeney (1:56.48).
Scarlett Aquatics’ Chloe Kim trailed early in the 500 free, but she took over shortly after the halfway point and went on to win by more than two seconds. Brinkleigh Hansen, the 14-year-old from Saint Petersburg who was the early leader, took second in 4:44.42, with Carmel’s Ellie Clark third in 4:44.76.
SwimMAC’s team of Karina Plaza, Scott, Caroline Mallard and Bree Smith captured first place in the women’s 400 medley relay in 3:34.80. TAC Titans took second in 3:35.39, and Lakeside was third (3:35.76). Lakeside’s team of Sawyer Tapp, Wilson York, Mercer and Alex Thiesing captured placed first in the men’s relay in 3:10.45, beating out a team from Bolles (3:12.10) and the Heilman-led Cavalier team (3:13.43).