Several college teams kicked off the 2015-2016 in Fort Meyers today at the FGCU Swimming Classic. This is the first year FGCU has hosted the meet. Ohio State (women), South Carolina (men/women), FAU (men), Rutgers (women), Buffalo (men/women) and Grand Canyon (men/women) are the teams competing in the first edition of the meet.
“The FGCU Classic is a short and fast format that will be great for fans to come out and enjoy,” said Florida Gulf Coast’s head coach Neal Studd. “We’re excited to host teams from the Big Ten and SEC, and I hope our girls are ready to race. It’s definitely going to be a competitive meet.”
Events are spread over two days, but favor the sprint events as the longest event offered is the 500 freestyle. Team’s each brought limited rosters, allowing two swimmers per event per team. The full schedule can be found below:
| Friday – 5:30 p.m. | Saturday – 10:30 a.m. |
| 200 Medley Relay | 400 Medley Relay |
| 400 IM | 100 IM |
| 200 Freestyle | 500 Freestyle |
| 50 Freestyle | 200 Breaststroke |
| 100 Butterfly | 100 Backstroke |
| 200 Backstroke | 100 Freestyle |
| 100 Breaststroke | 200 Butterfly |
| 400 Freestyle Relay | 200 IM |
| 200 Free Relay |
The home team started off with a win in the first event, combing for a time of 1:41.84 to win the women’s 200 medley relay. Barbara Cabarallo, Katie Armitage, Yee Ching Wong, and Katie Latham were the swimmers for Florida Gulf Coast, finishing just over a second ahead of the field. Armitage and Latham both posted the fastest splits in the field; Armitage was 28.40 in the 50 breast and Latham was 22.30 anchoring the freestyle leg. On the men’s side, Grand Canyon posted a time of 1:29.51 to win the relay.
Ohio State’s Lindsey Clary won the women’s 400 IM, posting the first NCAA “B” time standard of the day with her time of 4:18.64. Her teammate, Zhesi Li, later followed in her footsteps by winning the women’s 50 freestyle with an NCAA “B” standard time of 22.97.
Grand Canyon’s Daniil Antipov later dove in for the men’s 100 butterfly and ran away with it, winning with a B cut time of 48.24.
He was immediately followed by an impressive 200 backstroke from Rutgers’ Joanna Wu. She posted the team’s first NCAA B cut and event win for the team with her time of 1:58.71. Backstroke events can be a challenge at outdoor meets, especially for teams that train indoors, but she seemed to do well despite being outside.
Florida Gulf Coast’s Katie Armitage got the first individual win of the meet for the Eagles. She destroyed the women’s 100 breaststroke, winning with a time of 1:02.65.
The men’s 100 breaststroke was wild with two sophomore’s battling it out for the lead. It came down to the touch and it was Buffalo’s Itai De La Vega that won with a NCAA B cut time of 55.29. South Carolina’s Nils Wich-Glasen finished just behind him with a 55.31, also beating the NCAA B time standard.
Florida Gulf Coast closed the first session with a final win in the women’s 400 freestyle relay, winning with a time of 3:24.29. The South Carolina men won their 400 freestyle relay with a 3:00.44.
Other event winners:
- Men’s 400 IM – Tom Peribonio, South Carolina – 3:55.56
- Women’s 200 Freestyle – Taylor Worrell, South Carolina – 1:51.17
- Men’s 200 Freestyle – Akaram Mahmoud, South Carolina – 1:39.19
- Men’s 50 Freestyle – Illya Glazunov, Grand Canyon – 20.64
- Women’s 100 Butterfly – Paige Maynard, South Carolina – 54.86
- Men’s 200 Backstroke – Iegor Lytvenok, Grand Canyon – 1:50.49
After the first day of competition, Ohio State leads the women’s meet with 191 points, followed closely by FGCU at 190 and South Carolina with 169.
Grand Canyon and South Carolina are leading the men’s competition with 201 and 199 points, respectively.
You can find the full results of the first day of the FGCU Classic here.