What Did We Learn From The 2023 Speedo Atlanta Classic?

Originally published on May 16, 2023.

Last weekend, the 2023 Speedo Atlanta Classic took place. Overall, it was a low-stakes meet, but there was a lot of anticipation for it since several of swimming’s biggest stars were competing in it. And while in-season meets like this one don’t fully determine the results of bigger meets like U.S. trials and the Fukuoka World Championships, every single swim is a data point. And in this article, we will look at some of these data points, and discuss what they possibly mean for the future.

The Women’s 400 Free Will Still Be A Race, And Katie Ledecky Isn’t Out Of It

When 16-year-old Summer McIntosh took the world by storm this March to break the 400 free World Record at Canadian trials, it seemed like she was the runaway favorite to win the event at 2023 Worlds and the 2024 Olympics. Now don’t get me wrong, given her age and the fact that she’s the literal world record holder, my mind hasn’t changed about her being the favorite. But let’s remember that McIntosh, Ariarne Titmus, and Ledecky still have personal bests that are within half a second of each other, and Ledecky’s swim from this meet proved that she is very much still in the contender conversation.

On Friday night, Ledecky clocked a 3:58.84 400 free, which marked  the second time in her career that she went under 3:59 in an in-season meet. The only other instance was at the 2018 Pro Swim Series in Indianapolis (which was also where she broke the world record in the 1500 free), where she went 3:57.94. In addition, Ledecky’s swim from Friday was also just 0.69 seconds off of the 3:58.15 she went to win at the 2022 World Championships

We know that Ledecky is typically super fast in-season (and sometimes even faster in-season than she is at championship meets), but it’s clear that after hitting a plateau from 2017 to 2021, she’s found her groove again training under Anthony Nesty at Florida. Last year, she swam her fastest 200 free relay split ever and her fastest 800 free since 2018, in addition to dropping significant amounts off her in-season times at Worlds. So after how fast she went this weekend, it’s very plausible for her to get back into the 3:56 range. And in the state of this women’s 400 free, unless McIntosh makes some sort of ballistic drop in the near future (which isn’t entirely out of the question either), one has a chance at the top if they are going 3:56.

Caeleb Dressel Was Alright…But He’s Vulnerable Come Time For Trials

Ah…Caeleb Dressel. The most anticipated storyline of the meet.

After being out of competition for 11 months, Caeleb Dressel entered in six different events at the Speedo Atlanta Classic to swim his first meet since the 2022 World Championships. However, he only ended up swimming the finals of two different races, going 52.41 in the 100 fly and 22.57 in the 50 free.

Now, those times aren’t bad nor surprising for Dressel, especially coming back from such a long break and also because he usually doesn’t swim super fast at non-championship meets. He’s been 22/52-point in-season before and has gone on to have great international showings in the summer. Anyone who expected anything fast from him at this meet was bound to be disappointed knowing his history with in-season swims, so it wasn’t like his performances were a let-down or anything.

Dressel's first 100 fly of the last four years:
2019: 51.51 (broke the WR in the summer)
2020: 52.90 (Abeit, COVID year)
2021: 51.69 (broke the WR in the summer)
2022: 51.95 (went 50.01 at trials)

52.41 is not too shabby at all. Especially after all the time he's had off. https://t.co/LayBTjTf1f

— Yanyan Li (@yyanyanli1) May 12, 2023

However, Dressel’s performances also don’t really indicate that he’s going to be Back Like He’s Never Left when it comes time for U.S. trials in June. U.S. men’s sprinting is very competitive, and he can’t afford to be at 50% and still make the Worlds team comfortably in multiple individual events like he has in the past.

For example, Shaine Casas is one of the fastest 100 fly performers of all-time, and there’s also swimmers like Michael Andrew and Dare Rose who are either already sub-51 or going 51-lows. In the 50 free, Andrew and rising names like David Curtiss, Hunter Armstrong, Jack Alexy, Brooks Curry and Matt King will be present in the 50 free, while Curry, Alexy, Armstrong, Justin Ress, and Ryan Held will be in the conversation for the 100 free. Peak Dressel is better than all of these swimmers, but it’s just a matter of whether he’ll be at that peak—and he hasn’t shown it yet.

Is it possible that Dressel returns to form at trials and sweeps his main events? Yes. But even if his performances this week weren’t exactly a cause for worry, I’m not going to believe that he can replicate his old times until I actually see him do it. Now don’t get me wrong, he could retire today and he still would have accomplished almost all there is to accomplish in swimming. But this year, he’s the most vulnerable he’s been since 2017.

So really, all we can do is wait before jumping to conclusions.

Maxine Parker Might Surprise Us

I think a lot of people forget that Maxine Parker was actually a really good long course swimmer as a junior. At the 2019 World Junior Championships, Parker was a bit overshadowed by then-teenage sensation and her future Virginia teammate Gretchen Walsh, but she had a great meet of her own—going 24.75 to take individual silver in the 50 free. She hit a bit of a plateau in her first two seasons with Georgia in both long course and short course, setting best times at the 2021 SEC Championships and never really being able to replicate them afterwards.

However, after transferring to Virginia in the summer of 2022, Parker seems to have found her groove again, setting best times in the 50/100/200-yard freestyle events and scoring 24 individual points at NCAAs. Then, at the Speedo Atlanta Classic, she turned her short course success into long course, dipping under 25 seconds in the 50 free for the first time since 2019 to go 24.94, and then clocking a 54.21 in the 100 free to drop 0.73 seconds off her previous best time. Assuming that she’s not rested, there’s a chance that she could pull out a 53-point at trials, which would have her in the conversation to qualify for the women’s 4×100 free relay at Worlds. Now, she also has to get past the hurdle of performing fast at the right moment, but the potential is there.

It’s worth noting that Parker doesn’t have the greatest turns and underwaters, and she gains most of her speed on the surface of the water. For example, in the 100 free ‘B’ final at NCAAs, she was almost always coming up before everyone else. Usually, these “over the surface” types of swimmers who still manage to be great NCAA swimmers tend to see better/surprising results in long course after a season full of yards drops, so she could have a lot more in store.

Kate Douglass Looked Solid

The performances that sparked the most debate amongst swim fans were the ones of Kate Douglass, who swam her first long course meet since her record-breaking NCAA Championships performance that consisted of three individual titles and three NCAA records.

Across the board, Douglass had some very good swims. She dropped over a second and a half to win the 100 breast (1:07.47), set a new best time in the 50 free (24.40), outperformed her 2022 season-best in the 100 fly by nearly a second (from 58.14 in 2022 to 57.19 at the Atlanta classic), and swam faster than she did at the 2022 World Championships in the 200 breast (2:23.20 at worlds, 2:22.75 at the Atlanta Classic). She pulled off a 100 breast/100 fly double as well as a 200 breast/50 free double, which once again highlights her sheer versatility as well as a strong capacity to handle multiple races in one session.

Now none of those times were super statement-making in the grand scheme of things, but they were good for this point in the season and a good sign for the future, so we’ll have to wait until trials and Worlds to see what Douglass is truly able to throw down.

The biggest thing that I took from Douglass’s performances last week was that her success in the 200 IM will be largely dependent on how much she’s able to improve her backstroke split—that 35.11 split from her 200 IM this weekend caused Izzy Ivey to outsplit her by over two seconds at the and lead her at the halfway mark. Douglass eventually pulled ahead of Ivey and took the overall win, but the race highlighted a weakness of hers that may have been forgotten about after she didn’t touch the event in long course for two years.

Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t think Douglass is an “underwaters specialist”, as she even said that she was looking forward to spending less of her time underwater after leaving the NCAA. However, underwaters were able to mitigate the disadvantage she had on backstroke in short course, which she wouldn’t have in long course. She won bronze in Tokyo despite having the slowest backstroke split of the field by 0.43 seconds, but the 200 IM field both domestically and internationally have gotten significantly faster since then, so her best time of 2:09.04 with a bad backstroke split would be far from medal contention now. So unless she drops outworldly splits in her other strokes, she’s going to have to make big backstroke improvements in order to have a shot at both qualifying and medaling at Worlds in the 200 IM.

NOTE: Yes, Summer McIntosh could go a 2:06.89 200 IM with a 38.63 breaststroke split. But even so, two swimmers in the 2022 Worlds final were slower than her on breast while another two were within half a second of her. So I’d say her breaststroke is better than Douglass’ backstroke right now. I could write an entire article calculating 200 IM splits but that’s a topic for another day.

This meet also proved that even though Douglass said a month ago that her focus in the leadup to trials was on the 200 breast and 200 IM, the 50 free isn’t out of the question, especially if the 200 IM doesn’t work out. But that being said, it’s her first long course meet in a year, she’s probably not rested, and there’s still six weeks until trials. So like I said with Dressel, let’s wait until trials to jump to any big conclusions.