Kyle Chalmers shattered another national sprint record at the Australian Age Championships, and fellow 15-year-olds Matthew Wilson and Tamsin Cook joined him in adding their names to the record books on the third day of the youth meet down under.
Chalmers broke the Australian age 15 50 free mark, Wilson the 100 breast in that category and Cook the All Comers record in the 400 free on what was a huge day for the 15-year-old age bracket.
The Australian Age Championships Divide swimmers into different classes by age over an 8-day meet. For the regular swimming, those age groups are 12-13, 14, 15, 16, and 17-18. For the Multi-Class races, that’s 11-14, 15–16, and 17-18, though that varies for some events. With 204 events to cover, we’re going to take the strategy of really delving into the top 4-5 swims of each finals session, and then give more bullet-pointed lists of the rest of the winners. We hope that this will help our readers wade through a couple of hundred races to focus in on some of the really key information.
Wilson was the first to take down a record, winning the second event of the finals session. The SOPAC swimmer went 1:03.51 to win handily. That time took down the Australian Age record of 1:04.31 set by James Stacey back in 2004, and also knocked off the All Comers record (for the fastest time swum on Australian soil) in the age group – that record was 1:03.64 from Japan’s Kohei Goto in 2011.
After cruising to an easy #1 seed in prelims, 15-year-old Tamsin Cook blasted to her second win in as many days, going 4:09.29. That won by over 6 seconds and broke the old All Comers record of 4:10.66. Cook found herself just a hair off the Australian Age mark, which still stands at 4:08.89, one of the oldest records on the books from Hayley Lewis all the way back in 1990.
Chalmers had to wait almost until the end of the session to make his big statement, but it was worth the wait. After crushing the national 15 year olds record in the 100 free twice yesterday, Chalmers brought out his full speed on Wednesday, becoming the first 15-year-old in Aussie history under 23 seconds in the 50 free. Coming in as the third seed, Chalmers dropped a 22.68 to demolish the old record of 23.07, also getting the All Comers record in the same swim.
One more age record fell on the day, and it was in the final event. The St. Peters 4×100 free relay team in the 16 & Under bracket went 3:29.38 to take a second off the national age mark already held by the club’s 2010 relay. Jack Cartwright, Sean Morey, Bryan Poon and Brayden McCarthy combined for the record, with the 16-year-old McCarthy splitting 51.04 on the anchor leg.
Canadian Mary Sophie-Harvey picked up her 4th win of the meet, pacing the 200 fly for the 14-year-old girls category. Harvey went 2:16.41, coming from behind to top Laura Taylor of TSS by a half-second.
Another repeat winner was 16-year-old Alanna Bowles of Rocky City. Bowles went 4:46.37 to dominate the girls 400 IM, taking 5 seconds off her prelims time. Bowles crushed the field on almost every split, but did most of her damage on breaststroke, splitting 1:23.03 on that leg.
One of the more exciting races of the day was the 16-year-old girls 100 back, where Amy Forrester and Canadian Danielle Hanus went stroke for stroke the entire 100 meters. Forrester, of St Peters Western, trailed by just .02 at the 50 turn, but made up that small difference over the back half. The tough Canadian wouldn’t let Forrester go by her on the homestretch, though, and the two wound up tying for the victory at 1:02.28.
The boys 200 free for 17-18-year-olds came down to fingernails, with Regan Leong holding off a surging Isaac Jones by just .06, 1:48.90 to 1:48.96, great times for both junior swimmers as Australia continues to look both strong and deep in the freestyle events across age brackets.
Other Event Champions:
- Marion’s Ella Bond won the 15-year-olds 100 backstroke. Her 1:09.79 knocked off the field by a second and a half.
- The boys 14 200 fly was a tight battle. Ethan Dorrian of Dapto led at the 150, but Nudgee Brothers’ Charles Cox ran him down on the closing length to win in 2:07.28.
- Melbourne Vicenter’s Milly Batchelor cut 15 seconds off her seed to win the girls 12-13 800 freestyle, going 9:08.16.
- 18-year-old Leah Neale (no relation to her American sound-alike Lia Neal) took the girls 17-18 200 free, going 1:58.28.
- Canadian 16-year-old Markus Thormeyer won the boys 100 back. He went 56.29 to top Nunawading’s Nic Groenewald‘s 56.50. Both boys were just about a second off the Australian and All Comers marks.
- Jarryd Baxter of Central Gauteng Aquatics in South Africa won the boys 400 free for 15-year-olds. Baxter went 3:58.09, beating Jacob Vincent by just over two tenths.
- East Conney’s Gemma Cooney put up a 57.32 with a huge back half to eke out a win over Emma Hargrave of West Coast. Julia Hawkins was a close third for Nunawading.
- Miami’s Andrew Ryan took the boys 14 100 free easily, going 52.88.
- 13-year-old Minna Atherton defended her 200 back title for the 12-13 girls. She went 2:14.54, an improvement of a second and a half from a year ago.
- Leo MacAlister of Carlile won the boys version of that event, going 2:11.11.
- St. Peters 17-year-old Georgia Bohl won the girls 17-18 200 breast. Her 2:27.77 topped the field by 3 seconds, giving her a title she could defend next season.
- In the boys event, James McKechnie of Starplex denied Jake Baggaley a repeat title. McKechnie went 2:13.62 to run away from Baggaley by over three seconds.
- Carlile’s Cal Sherington came from behind to win the boys 400 IM for 16-year-olds. His 1:01.05 closing split brought him to a 4:27.09 victory, just two tenths up on Mitchell Davenport-Wright.
- Chandler 15-year-old Shayna Jack took home the girls 50 free, powering away in 25.34 to win by almost a second.
- Aaron Mansfield of Kawana Waters cut 22 seconds off his seed time to win the boys 12-13 800 free. Mansfield, 12, went 8:36.37, touching out Elijah Winnington of Palm Beach by just .05 for the title.
Other Relays:
- Tuggeranong’s 14 & Under girls won their 4×50 medley relay, going 1:59.24. They jumped out to an early lead on Courtney Taylor‘s 30.40 backstroke leg and never looked back.
- The boys in that age bracket saw MLC Aquatic take the relay. Dante Negri‘s 25.7 butterfly split was devastating to the rest of the field, and David Schlicht went 31.6 on breaststroke, the fastest of the field. The team went 1:52.25 to win easily.
- The relay team from Canada took the girls 16 & Under 4×100 free relay, going 3:49.86. That included a 57.1 anchor leg from Meryn McCann and a 57.25 on the leadoff from Georgia Kidd.