Manuel wins 100m free at Winter Nationals
Adrian qualifies for Olympic Trials
GREENSBORO, North Carolina, Dec 2, (AP): Twotime Olympic champion Simone Manuel completed a sweep of the sprint freestyles at the USA Swimming Winter Nationals, winning the 100-meter race Saturday.
Manuel touched in 53.38 seconds to beat Margo Geer by a second. Katie Ledecky, the 800, 400 and 200 free winner this week, finished fifth in in 54.76.
Manuel, who holds the American record in the event at 52.27, tied for the gold medal in the 100 free at the Rio Olympics. She won the 50 free Thursday night feel like I’m in a good place in my training. It’s good to have a meet like this at the end of the year, knowing that as we turn the calendar to 2019, things will get serious pretty quickly. I kind of feel like I get a head start for 2019 by competing in a meet like this.”
Eight-time Olympic medal winner Nathan Adrian qualified for the Olympic Trials in the 50 free and 100 free based on his times.
Adrian won the 50 free on Thursday night and followed that up with a runner-up finish in the 100 free Saturday, touching two-hundredths of a second behind Michael Chadwick (48.57).
“I’m in a good place and I’m really excited about that,” Adrian said. “I’ve been training for about eight and a half weeks now, so I’ve never come to a Winter Nationals with such a small window of training in place. I didn’t love getting second (in the 100), but I’m coming away with a 48.59, which I think is as good as any of my times in season last year. We’ll go off that and not try to get any slower than that as we move into 2019.”
A total of 106 swimmers qualified for Olympic Trials.
Hali Flickinger, a member of the 2016 Olympic team, qualified for the Olympic Trials in five events (200 free, 400 free, 400 IM, 200 back, 200 fly), and 14-year old Claire Curzan was the youngest qualifier in three events (the 50 free, 100 fly, and 100 back). Jake Hescock #88 of the UCF Knights catches a touchdown pass over Curtis Akins #7 of the Memphis Tigers during the second quarter of the American Athletic Championship at Spectrum Stadium on Dec 1
in Orlando, Florida. (AFP)