After two individual wins on day 1 of the 2011 Australian University Games, University of Melbourne’s Marieke Guehrer, a member of the Aussie National Team, really tore into the competition on day 2. This included wins in her two best individual events (the 50 fly and 50 free), another in the 100 back, and altogether four more meet records.
She first gave us a taste of her speed in the 50 free, where she barely clipped her own meet record (by .01, from 2009) with a winning mark of 25.73. That bested her Melbourne, and World University Games, teammate Jessica Morrison, who touched 2nd in 26.67.
Guehrer’s next event was the 50 fly, which is by far her best race (she’s the 2009 World Champion and 2010 Pan Pac Champion in the event). She really blew away the rest of the competition, winning by a body in a race that’s only a pool-length long, in 26.93, which again breaks her meet record from 2009 (27.80). She went a bit more outside of her comfort zone in her next race, the 100 back, where she won in 1:04.81, which was again a Meet Record (Amy Lucas, 1:04.89). This was a repeat of yesterday’s 50-meter battle with her younger teammate Grace Loh, who again was done in by Guehrer’s 9-inch height advantage. Loh would take 2nd in 1:05.06.
Those three swimmers – Guehrer, Loh, and Morrison – would team up with teenager Nicolette Lyttle to take the 400 free relay in 4:02.82, which also broke the Meet Record by over two seconds.
In the women’s 200 breaststroke, the 18-year old Emily Selig put up a very good time of 3:34.55, which was a new Meet Record (breaking Bianca Conwell’s mark from 2000 of 2:35.15). The young Selig is another fast-riser in a very deep Australian breaststroke field, and has an outside shot at the Olympic squad if Leisel Jones chooses not to swim the event as she did at this year’s World Championships. While this is nowhere near a career-best time for her, it is a very good time considering the part of her training she is in (a.k.a. the grinding build to March’s Olympic Trials).
On the men’s side, Queensland University of Technology again kept pace with Melbourne with several event winns. This included a 22.69 50 free from another Aussie National Teamer Kyle Richardson, which was probably the swim of the day for the men. Christian Sprenger was also back in action on the men’s side with a win in the 200 breaststroke. He’s been much faster (even at this meet in past years), but still had a four-second margin of victory in 2:19.40.
The Melbourne men also pitched in a big helping hand today, partially with a win in the 400 free from Andrew Cameron in 4:08.48. That’s a career-best time by three seconds for the 21-year old. He also anchored the Melbourne 400 free relay to a 2nd-place finish in 3:40.42. The winner of that race was Macquarie University in 3:37.97.
In team scoring, the battle remains between Melbourne and Queensland University of Technology, which are by far the two swimming powerhouses to earn top-swimming honors, which will go a long way to each team’s overall Games score. Remember, this meet is part of a larger University competition that includes 29 different disciplines.
Melbourne lept out to a huge lead on day 2 after more balanced scoring, with 240 points. Queensland Tech now sits with 147, and Macquarie is trying to pull themselves into position for 2nd thanks to a great day-two performance.