Next Card Up: Eastin Breaks DiRado NAG with 3:59 in 400 IM

The 17-18 National Age Group (NAG) 400 IM record has passed from one Stanford Cardinal standout to another as Ella Eastin has broken Maya DiRado‘s mark at the 2016 Pac-12 Championships.

Eastin went 3:59.30 at Friday night’s finals, moving past DiRado’s 2012 mark of 3:59.88. That continues a stellar season for Eastin, following in the shoes of DiRado, who orginally set the mark in her freshman year at Stanford.

DiRado put up her time at the 2012 NCAA Championships, taking 4th in what was perhaps the most loaded 400 IM field in NCAA history. Katinka Hosszu won that event, setting NCAA and U.S. Open marks that still stand at 3:56.54. Meanwhile Olympians Caitlin Leverenz and Elizabeth Beisel were second and third, respectively.

Eastin, for her part, is the NCAA favorite in 2016, now sitting first in the nation this season by more than 4 seconds.

Eastin’s swim becomes the fastest swim for a 17-18-year-old in history, plus moves her to #6 on the all-time 400 IM list:

1. Katinka Hosszu: 3:56.54, 2012 (U.S. Open, NCAA records)
2. Caitlin Leverenz: 3:57.89, 2012 (American record)
3. Maya DiRado: 3:58.12, 2014
4. Julia Smit: 3:58.23, 2010
5. Elizabeth Beisel: 3:58.35, 2012
6. Ella Eastin: 3:59.30, 2016 (17-18 NAG)
7. Melanie Margalis: 3:59.85, 2014

Those are the only 7 women to go under four minutes in the event, per USA Swimming’s records.

Here’s a quick comparison of Eastin’s splits with DiRado’s splits from her 2012 swim:

Though DiRado closed significantly better, Eastin was faster on three of the four legs, including huge deficits on the fly and back.