Kate Douglass Entered In Six Events In Three Different Strokes at U.S. Trials

2022 PHILLIPS 66 INTERNATIONAL TEAM TRIALS

• April 26-30, 2022
• Greensboro, NC
• Greensboro Aquatic Center
• LCM (50m)
• FINA Qualifying Criteria
• SwimSwam Preview Index
• Meet Central
• Psych Sheets
• Live Results

Not many swimmers in America can claim to be as versatile as Kate Douglass is right now. To highlight her wide range of events, the University of Virginia swimmer is entered in a whopping six different races at U.S. Trials. In addition, she will also be racing three different stokes (freestyle, breaststroke, butterfly), as well as the IM.

Although it’s not confirmed that she’s actually going to swim these events, the scary thing is that even if she did, she has a legitimate shot at making the Worlds team in all of them.

If she ends up swimming everything, she’s going to be racing on every single day of the meet aside from Day 4. On Day 2 (200 Breast and 50 fly) and Day 5 (200 IM and 50 free), she will have doubles. On both of those days, she will be swimming a longer event followed by a shorter event, so it will be interesting to see if she has enough energy to keep up with her more well-rested competitors in the 50s.

Kate Douglass‘s 2022 U.S. Trials Schedule:

Tuesday, April 26 – Day 1

• 100 free

Wednesday, April 27 – Day 2

• 200 breast
• 50 fly

Thursday, April 28 – Day 3

• 100 fly

Friday, April 29 – Day 4

• NONE

Saturday, April 30 – Day 5

• 200 IM
• 50 free

The sprint events will be very competitive for Douglass, as she will be head-to-head with a plethora of young high school and college stars that are all challenging for the throne such as Stanford swimmers Claire Curzan and Torri Huske, and her UVA teammate Gretchen Walsh.

Douglass’s meet will kick off with the 100 free. Her best time is a 54.14 from when she finished seventh at trials last year. Allison Schmitt and Catie DeLoof, swimmers who finished in front of her and were selected to swim 4×100 free relay at the Olympics over her, are not entered in the psych sheets. This gives Douglass a chance to move up the ranks and earn herself a spot on that free relay.

The 100 fly will also be a big one for Douglass, considering that she just missed the Olympic team by 0.13 when she finished third at trials last year with a time of 56.56 behind Torri Huske and Claire Curzan.  Since then, she has gone on to break the American record in the event, swimming a 49.04 to break Curzan’s former AR of 49.24 and beat Huske in the same race. Douglass has never swam the 50 fly as an individual race before, but her best time stands as a 26.32 from her 100 fly trials swim last year and has her seeded third.

As the fifth seed in the 50 free, Douglass comes in with a best time of 24.54. She has the hot hand of being the newly-crowned American record in the yards version of the event, swimming a 20.84 at NCAAs.

In the 200 breast, Douglass will have to break through the wall of Lily King and Annie Lazor in order to earn herself a spot. She broke King’s American record in the 200 yard breast at NCAAs with a 2:02.19, but is seeded all the way in 28th because she doesn’t have any official meters swims recorded. However, she did go a 2:24.02 at an UVA time trial meet, which would have her unofficially seeded as fourth.

Douglass’s best event, the 200 IM, falls on the last day of her long meet. She won the bronze medal in this event at the Olympics last year, and is the favorite to make the Worlds team this year with her teammate, Alex Walsh. She is seeded second behind Walsh with a time of 2:09.04.

Although Douglass will have to get through twelve different races (if you count both prelims and finals), the lack of a semifinal round will lighten the load on her. Aside, if there’s anyone who can pull off the tough schedule, it’s her. We just saw her come off an NCAA meet where she swam ten races in four days, and she ended up breaking the American record in three of her individual events, so expect no less when it comes to Worlds trials.