Olympic Trials: Day 4, Ledecky has a Historic Double Win!
By Reach for the Wall Staff
The second event of Wednesday night’s finals was Women’s 200 Freestyle, where Katie Ledecky (Stanford/NCAP) held the top seed and veteran swimmers Allison Schmitt and Leah Smith were in the field of 8. Allison and Katie traded the lead over the first 150 with Katie hitting final turn .77 ahead of the field. The last 50 sealed it for Katie as she was the only one to split under 30 seconds coming home & touched the wall 1st in 1:55.11, faster than she swam in both prelims and semifinals. Allison Schmitt touched 2nd, Paige Madden 3rd, and Katie McLouhglan 4th, all earning their spots on the Olympic team!
The next race featuring a swimmer from the DMV was the Men’s 200 Breaststroke, where Andrew Wilson competed in the first heat of the semifinal. Andrew held the lead in his heat most of the race, touching the wall second to Nic Fink in 2:09.48. This swim was good enough to move forward to finals tonight as the 5th seed. The race should be exciting as there is only a .5 second separation from 1st through 5th seeds.
The Women’s 200 IM featured AAC phenom Torri Huske, who entered the race as the 6th seed. As with her semifinal race, Torri jumped out to the lead in butterfly, and maintained the advantage in backstroke by .66 over Alex Walsh. With a strong breaststroke, Alex took the lead at the 150 and did not relinquish. Alex went on to win the race in 2:09.30, just touching out her UVA teammate Kate Douglass by .02! Torri hit the wall 4th, achieving a personal best of 2:10.38
The final event of the night was the Women’s 1500, an event that is in its inaugural year for the Olympics. There wasn’t much doubt who the favorite was in this race as Katie swam 13 seconds faster than her next challenger in the prelim race. Katie was faster in finals at each 100 and finished the race in 15:40.50, three seconds faster than her prelim swim. Second place went to Erica Sullivan, who touched in 15:51.18, which was 5 seconds faster than her prelim swim!
Today’s Schedule:
Watch prelims online via NBC and Finals on TV via NBC:
| Thursday, June 17 11:00am EST | Thursday, June 17 8:00 PM EST |
| Women’s 100 Freestyle | Men’s 800 Freestyle – FINAL |
| Men’s 200 Backstroke | Men’s 200 Breaststroke – FINAL |
| Women’s 200 Breaststroke | Women’s 100 Freestyle – Semifinal |
| Men’s 200 Individual Medley | Men’s 200 Backstroke – Semifinal |
| Women’s 200 Butterfly – FINAL | |
| Men’s 100 Freestyle – FINAL | |
| Women’s 200 Breaststroke – Semifinal | |
| Men’s 200 Individual Medley – Semifinal |