OMAHA, Nebraska, June 8. WITH only 17 days remaining until the start of the 2012 US Olympic Trials in Omaha, the CenturyLink Center and the city of Omaha are ready as the first wave of competitors tested out the newly constructed pool during the first night of action at the Mutual of Omaha Swimvitational. <\/p>\n
The University of Arizona's Margo Geer opened the competition with a blistering swim in the women's 100 free as she touched in 54.93, more than a second ahead of Rhiannon Jeffrey's 56.06. Rebecca Thompson of the University of Wisconsin placed third in 56.63. <\/p>\n
South Africa's Roland Schoeman, the 2004 Olympic silver medalist in the 100 free, won the same race tonight in 49.07 while representing Phoenix Swim Club. Darian Townsend, who teamed with Schoeman to win gold in the 4×100 free relay in Athens, touched second in 49.85. Club Hawkeye's Jordan Huff took third in 50.91.<\/p>\n
Tucson Ford's Amanda Beard, who won the 200 breast at the 2004 Olympics, dominated the final heat of the women's 200 breast tonight but drew a disqualification in the event due to having her elbows out of the water. Wisconsin's Brittany Kimmitt took the victory in 2:31.45, just out-touching Louisville's Giselle Kohoyda (2:31.51). Ashley Wanland of Wisconsin touched third in 2:33.30.<\/p>\n
The race in the men's 200 breast came down to three University of Arizona-based swimmers — Kevin Cordes, Clark Burckle and Carl Mickelson. Cordes led nearly the entire race before Mickelson and Burckle snuck by him in the last 10 yards. Mickelson touched in 2:14.07, with Burckle (2:14.11) and Cordes (2:14.43) in second and third. <\/p>\n
Lakeside's Leah Stevens led wire to wire in the women's 400 free, putting in a dominating performance to win in 4:15.79. Swim Pasadena's Kathryn Campbell swam a 4:18.81 for second while La Mirada Armada's Samantha Shellem picked up third in 4:20.22.<\/p>\n
In the men's 400 free, Wisconsin's Michael Weiss reeled in South African Olympian Jean Basson out of Tucson Ford after trailing for 300 meters, touching in 4:00.20 to Basson's 4:00.96. La Mirada Armada's Ryan Kao took third in 4:02.03. <\/p>\n
Erin Campbell of Tucson Ford took the women's 100 fly out quickly and held off the field with a winning time of 1:00.93. Wisconsin's Rebecka Palm posted a 1:01.25 to take second as Club Huskers' Shannon Guy was third (1:01.48). <\/p>\n
In the final individual event of the night, Arizona's Giles Smith out-raced Tucson Ford's Masayuki Kishida to the finish, winning in 53.24. Kishida touched in 53.49 while Club Hawkeye's Byron Butler finished third in 55.31.<\/p>\n
The men's and women's 4×100 free relays closed out the evening. Phoenix Swim Club's Keaton Blovad (58.08), Taryn Collura (58.50), Rowan Hauber (59.49) and Hannah Holman (59.05) won the women's event in 3:55.12 while New Trier's Daniel Whitcomb (53.73), Reed Malone (52.54), Jack Mangan (52.40) and Jonathan Grodecki (51.95) took home the men's title in 3:30.62.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
OMAHA, Nebraska, June 8. WITH only 17 days remaining until the start of the 2012 US Olympic Trials in Omaha, the CenturyLink Center and the city of Omaha are ready<\/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":[3,7,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30774","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-featured","category-usa","category-zzzzzzzzz"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\r\n