Top Five Swimming Headlines Of the Past Week (The Week That Was)

PHOENIX, Arizona, September 2. THE start of the FINA World Cup series and the always exciting junior Pan Pacific championships were the main sources of headlines in swimming this past week, with world records falling in the Middle East and several teenage stars getting a chance to shine in Hawaii. We’re counting down the top five headlines of the week on today’s show, and we start here in the United States – Indiana, to be specific – for number five.

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On Monday Swimming World Magazine announced the schools that won the boys and girls national high school swimming team titles. This is an honor we’ve given out since 1971, and though it is a title only for a hypothetical meet it has been a source of pride for many high schools across the United States in the past 43 years. Carmel High School in Indiana won the girls title for the second consecutive year and third time in the school’s history. Carmel won all three relays at the Indiana state meet, breaking national records each time to cement the victory. Indiana also can boast about having the best boys high school swim team, with Chesterton winning for the first time. Several fast swimmers helped Chesterton win the title, and a national high school record in the 200 medley relay certainly doesn’t hurt. If you’re a subscriber to Swimming World Magazine, you will be getting your copy of the September issue in the mail soon, and you can read more about Carmel’s and Chesterton’s impressive seasons.

For the number four headline on the show, we go over to Scotland, where Commonwealth Games champion Ross Murdoch spent some time with 5-year-old Brian Fitzpatrick after Brian sent off a letter to his biggest swimming hero. Since neither Brian nor his parents knew where to send the letter, it was up to the Scottish mail service to deliver the letter to Murdoch. Once it got into Murdoch’s hands, he sent out a message to his Twitter followers to help him locate Brian. It only took a day for Twitter fans to find Brian, and the two spent time at the University of Stirling, where Murdoch trains. Brian got to hold a Commonwealth Games medal and beat Murdoch in a five-meter race to the wall after a brief swimming lesson. As great as these photos are, nothing beats this photo of Brian fast asleep on the way home after a fun but obviously exhausting day.

The junior Pan Pacific championships continues to grow in importance, with several swimmers emerging from the meet into senior-level status. That could very well be the case after what we saw last week in Hawaii, where the United States dominated the medal podium with 27 out of 34 wins, and that’s our number three headline. Sierra Schmidt was voted the meet’s top female, while Andrew Seliskar took the award for top male. The two were given the award solely on the basis of earning the most FINA points in a single swim, though few would argue that they don’t deserve the awards after winning multiple gold medals. Schmidt won the 800 and 1500 freestyles at the meet, and won the B final of the 400 free. As for Seliskar, he set the junior world record in the 200 fly with a 1:55.92 and won both individual medley events. Australia and Japan also scored some gold medals, with Japan showing its young strength in the breaststroke and the Aussies continuing to be a strong presence in the freestyle events. We have full recaps of each day from the junior Pan Pacs on swimmingworld.com.

Over in the Middle East, the first meet of the FINA World Cup series in Qatar featured an American record in the 200 butterfly by Tom Shields with a 1:50.08 to capture number two in our look at the top five swimming headlines of the week. Shields took the race out very hard, similar to what he did to win the 200 fly at long course nationals last month, turning under world record pace through 150 meters. Though Shields couldn’t hold on to Chad Le Clos’ world record speed at the finish, his time was a personal best by six tenths of a second. Shields didn’t have the type of meet he had hoped for at the Pan Pacific championships, missing the final of the 100 fly and getting disqualified in the prelims of the 200 fly. But he was able to put that aside for some great swimming in Doha and in Dubai, earning nearly $30,000 in cash.

As great as Shields’ American record was in the 200 fly, it paled in comparison to the five world records Katinka Hosszu broke in the individual medleys at the first two meets of the World Cup. In Qatar, Hosszu broke all three IM records over the course of two days, then traveled to the United Arab Emirates to break the 100 IM and 200 IM records again. For each of those swims, the Hungarian Iron Lady got a $10,000 bonus that FINA offered for world records. Hosszu won the overall women’s World Cup title in 2012 and 2013, and is looking unstoppable to win in 2014, with 209 more points than second place Inge Dekker, and almost twice as much money as anyone has earned so far this year in the World Cup. Hungary had every reason to be joyous last weekend, not only for Hosszu’s world records, but for Daniel Gyurta’s 2:00.48 in the 200 breast that broke his five-year-old world record. Gyurta decided to not swim the 200 breast a couple of weeks ago at the European championships, but the break from his pet event didn’t last very long. Gyurta swam a 2:01.06 in Qatar and found an extra boost in Dubai to go six tenths faster. The World Cup resumes in Hong Kong on September 29, and I’m sure the racing will be just as exciting.

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