New Team Records at Junior Nationals!
Summer Junior Nationals Meet Recap
Wave was represented by one swimmer, Jaiden Sreenivasan, at the Summer Junior Nationals in Irvine, California from July 23-27. Before diving into his results, Coach Tatiana will explain how the USA Swimming National Meets are built to follow a progressive tier of cuts. The goal of having different tiers of National Meets is to help swimmers stay motivated to move up to the next level while still offering a very competitive environment for young swimmers. The National Meets are divided in the following meets:
- Futures Championships: This is the first tier of the National Meets with pretty fast qualifying times (way faster than Sectionals) and it is held in five locations across the country. Swimmers of any age can swim this meet, but there is a specific rule for swimmers over 19 years old who qualify for finals.
- Winter Junior Nationals (SCY): This is the second tier with faster qualifying times than Futures and is held in only two locations (West and East). Only swimmers 18&U can swim this meet.
- Summer Junior Nationals (LCM): Similar format to Winter Juniors but in the long course pool and cuts are the fastest cuts for the Junior level. This is the meet that Jaiden attended this summer!
Besides these three tiers of National Meets, there are also Open Meets where the cuts are the fastest cuts in the country and where Olympians and college swimmers will show up and race. A few examples of these meets are US Open (SCY- winter), TYR Pro Series, Summer Nationals (LCM), and Olympic Trials (LCM once every 4 years)
Now, let's dive into Jaiden's swims. This was his first time qualifying and swimming at Summer Junior Nationals. He qualified to swim in four events and opted to swim only three events and do two time trials. It was a great opportunity to race with some of the fastest swimmers in the country, learn some important lessons about swimming in high level meets, and gain more experience for the upcoming meets.
400 IM: 4:29.58 - Open Record & Boys 17-18 Record
Jaiden went a best time in the 400 IM in his second attempt swimming this event. He swam the 400 IM on Day 1 and couldn’t execute the race strategy he had planned. So we decided to time trial the 400 IM on the next day and he was able to do an excellent race swimming a very strong breaststroke leg, as planned, to go a lifetime best and break his own Open Record.
200 IM: 2:06.37 - Open Record & Boys 17-18 Record
Jaiden did his second time trial in the 200 IM on the last day and he crushed it! With a fantastic middle 100 (back & breaststroke legs), he smashed his old time by almost 9 seconds and--besides breaking the team record--he made the Summer Junior Nationals cut in this event.
200 Free & 200 Breast
Jaiden got the cuts for both events during Senior Champs, which was only three days before Summer Juniors. So we decided to swim both at Juniors. Why not swim all four events? He had huge time drops in those events at Senior Champs where he dropped 5 seconds in the 200 Free and 3 seconds in the 200 Breast, and he felt a bit hard to repeat those times again in such a short time between those meets. At Champs, he broke the Open Record and Boys 17-18 in both events.
Curiosity about the meet: due to Olympic Trials in June, USA Swimming held Summer Nationals (Open) and Summer Junior Nationals (18& Under) together this year. Swimmers were seeded by their times, regardless of age, then there were some specific rules to qualify for finals (A-B: any age, C-D: 18& under only). That was a fantastic opportunity for younger swimmers to be at the same pool deck and environment as Olympians, pro and college swimmers. It was a FAST meet!
Congrats Jaiden for your daily dedication and commitment that resulted in an awesome season!
