FORT MYERS BEACH, Florida, June 3. CHIP Peterson, one of the world\u2019s premier open-water swimmers, claimed victory Friday in the 5K race as the United States Open Water National Championships got started. Peterson, the reigning world champ in the 10K distance, prevailed in the shorter distance in a time of 53:10. <\/p>\n
In the women\u2019s race, Kirsten Groome made the most of her first foray into the open-water ranks. Representing the North Baltimore Aquatic Club, Groome edged out Chloe Sutton of The Fish. Groome and Sutton are among the United States\u2019 elite youngsters in the distance freestyle events. Sutton is a training partner of Kate Ziegler under coach Ray Benecki.<\/p>\n
The event will continue with the 10K championship races on Sunday and the 25K races on Tuesday. When the Beijing Olympics roll around in 2008, open-water swimming will be part of the program. Consequently, a number of distance swimmers from the pool have indicated a desire to compete in the new realm.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
FORT MYERS BEACH, Florida, June 3. CHIP Peterson, one of the world\u2019s premier open-water swimmers, claimed victory Friday in the 5K race as the United States Open Water National Championships<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7,10,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11421","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-usa","category-world","category-zzzzzzzzz"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\r\n