5 Storylines After Day 1 of the ISL European Derby in London

2019 INTERNATIONAL SWIMMING LEAGUE – EUROPEAN DERBY

• Saturday, November 23 – Sunday, November 24, 2019
• 5:00-7:00 PM Local Time (12:00 noon – 2:00 PM, U.S. Eastern Time)
• London Aquatics Centre – London, England
• Short Course Meters (SCM) format
• European franchises: Aqua Centurions, Energy Standard, Iron, London Roar
• Start Lists
• Day 1 Complete Results (with Corrected MVP Standings)

Day 1 of the European Derby meet brought excitement, records, and storylines a-plenty, as has every stop of the International Swimming League so far this season.

Below are 5 key storylines that we’re watching after day 1 of the meet as we head into the final days of regular season competition on Sunday.

1. Adam Peaty Places Higher in the 200 Breast than in the 50 Breast

There are two axioms held as truths about British swimmer Adam Peaty in the breaststrokes: he’s better in the sprint distances, 50 and 100 meters, than he is in the 200 meters; and he’s better in long course than he is in short course. Yet, in the 200 short course meter breaststroke, which by the above axioms should be his weakest event this weekend, he actually placed 2nd in the 200 yard breaststroke, swimming a 2:04.63. That’s as compared to placing 4th in the 50 breaststroke.

While in-season, and in short course, Peaty is certainly not the same lock in short course meters as he is in long course meters, that is still an unexpected comparative result. He swam a 26.00 in the 50 breaststroke, which is slower than he was in Budapest in his other ISL appearance so far this season, and that left him .38 seconds behind Fabio Scozzoli‘s win and .11 seconds behind Vlad Morozov’s 2nd-place finish.

2. Could Duncan Scott Really Swim 9 Races?

Pre-meet, Duncan Scott of the London Roar was entered to swim 9 races in his ISL debut, which would be the biggest schedule that we’ve seen yet in the league this season. What was even wonkier is that none of those races were the 200 free, his best event.

London has made tons of mid-meet changes this season, but it turns out, we might actually see this monster schedule from Scott – who’s making a big impact so far for London.

While he was only 7th in the 50 free, he placed a surprise 2nd in the 400 IM in 4:04.55 – which is his best time by a second-and-a-half. Perhaps after an even bigger schedule last week at the BUCS Championships, this lineup isn’t feeling so intimidating for Scott, but we still suspect that there might be a change coming on Sunday. He’s currently scheduled to race the 100 free in session 1, the 400 free and mixed 400 free relay in session 2, and the 200 fly and 50 free skins event in session 3. That leaves him open to potentially a 100 free, 200 fly and 50 skins race all in the period of about 30 minutes, without even accounting for the potential for multiple rounds of the 50 at the end.

Based on the racing so far, with London losing to Energy Standard in spite of an Energy Standard disqualification of their winning 400 free relay at the end of Saturday’s session, London will need to do something in the skins race. That means, at a minimum, putting someone into the semi-finals (and probably better than that given the quality of Florent Manaudou and Ben Proud for Energy Standard). After finishing 7th in the 50 free individually, there’s no way that they can expect him to make the semis after that ghastly triple on Sunday, so something is going to have to give there.

3. Mixed Results in New Day 1 Schedule for Emma McKeon

London Roar swimmer Emma McKeon had mixed results in a new day 1 lineup she tested out on Saturday. While she started off her day with a bang, beating out the World Record holder Sarah Sjostrom in the 100 fly, a new 4-race schedule on day 1 for the Aussie star didn’t go fully to plan.

In the last 2 meets, she has raced the 100 fly, the 200 free, and on the London 400 free relay. This week, she added a 50 free into that mix. Her first 2 races went well, but once that 50 free came up, she didn’t perform as well at the end of the session. She was 5th in the 50 free in 23.96 and 4th in the 200 free in 1:53.32. That’s the first time that she hasn’t won the 200 free this season, though her time wasn’t terribly far off the 1:53.18 that she did in Budapest.

Instead, she was out-touched by the narrowest of margins by Femke Heemskerk (1:53.22) and Federica Pellegrini (1:53.28) on Saturday. The 1:52.7 from Energy Standard’s Kayla Sanchez ranks 2nd in the world this year – there doesn’t seem to be much anybody was going to do about that – but with such a tight margin on that 50 free, the extra swim could have made that .14 second difference between McKeon and 2nd place.

This is a good meet to experiment at though, and with Cate and Bronte Campbell on the roster, they can simply shift Bronte back into the race for the finale in Las Vegas with essentially zero downside, and a few points of upside.

Stump: this is why times still matter, even in a team-based format. Without times, we wouldn’t know that McKeon still swam pretty well in the 200 free, and everyone else just swam better. There is room in swimming for context provided by both times and points.

4. Deja Vu with a relay DQ

For the 2nd-straight meet, Energy standard has been disqualified in a men’s relay. In Naples, the men’s 400 medley relay was called when Ivan Girev left .04 seconds early on the anchor. In London, it was again Girev, this time on the 3rd leg of the 400 free relay, where he jumped by a full tenth of a second.

Frankly, Energy Standard has an advantage on relay exchanges in that much of their team, moreso than any other team in the league, trains together year-round in Turkey. But, in his defense, Girev is not part of that group, and at 19, he’s young still.

But Energy Standard will need to get that fixed ahead of the Las Vegas finale. While it looks like they might overcome that problem here in London, the 22 points they gave away via that disqualification to London Roar is too many to win a title.

5. “Old Man” Strength

There is a certain class of swimmers, many of them Brazilians or Italians, who have sort of pushed along into their 30s as 50 meter specialists, racing lots of money meets like the World Cup or the Mare Nostrums, probably earning a decent living, but without much hope of an Olympic medal, given that the 50 meter stroke events are not Olympic events.

Regular readers of SwimSwam will recognize the names because of their success on multiple weekends within a season, but to lay-people their names will probably never be heard.

But now, in the ISL, these swimmers have become valuable commodities. That’s true of Guilherme Guido of the London Roar, who won the 50 back on Saturday in 22.82 at 31-years old, and Fabio Scozzoli, who won the 50 breast on Saturday in 25.62 at 31-years old. Felipe Lima at 36 has a win this season as well, and these guys are swimming some of the best times in their careers in their 30s, which for most of the history of the sport of swimming is post-retirement.

Matt Grevers, at 34, has been a star as well, with 2 event wins this season individually, joking that he tapers for as many meets as he can. Jeremy Stravius has been revived a little at 31 as well.

Racing is different as swimmers get into their 30s. They’re generally calmer, more confident, more driven by the competition than the clock.

This is the dream that the ISL provides. It’s unlikely that any of those guys above will ever again win an Olympic gold medal. But there’s still something else for them to chase, to fight for, to extend their careers for, and, in cases like Grevers, stretch the star-power from the peak of his career in his 20s into another decade for fans of the sport.