Gretchen Walsh Sizzles With Quickest 50 Fly Split Ever in Virginia-Va Tech Dual Meet; Hokie Men Shine
Coming off the greatest short course performance ever at the recent 25-meter World Championships in Budapest, Gretchen Walsh is back in a University of Virginia cap and continuing to impress. Walsh and her fellow Cavaliers celebrated senior day against their in-state rival Virginia Tech Hokies while two Olympians made their season debut: fifth-year Alex Walsh, who sat out the first semester, and freshman Katie Grimes, who enrolled at UVA midyear.
Virginia’s women finished with a win, scoring 215 points to Virginia Tech’s 85, with Grimes the top performer with three individual wins. The Hokie men secured a 198-102 win behind three wins from Carles Coll Marti.
Virginia’s women opened up with an astounding performance in the 200 medley relay, their time of 1:31.53 coming within two hundredths of the American, U.S. Open and NCAA records in the event. Virginia set the all-time record in 2023. The Walsh sisters swam the middle legs, with Alex on breaststroke and Gretchen on butterfly. Claire Curzan led off, and freshman Anna Moesch handled freestyle.
Gretchen’s split of 20.87 on butterfly was by far the fastest in history. For comparison, no one split under 22 at last season’s NCAA Championships, a meet where Gretchen led off Virginia’s title-winning squad.
The younger Walsh sister dominated the sprint freestyle events as expected, clocking 20.74 in the 50 free and 46.12 in the 100. No one else has ever been quicker in the splash-and-dash, while the 100-yard time is the country’s fastest this season by a half-second.
Grimes, a two-time U.S. Olympian and Olympic silver medalist in the 400 IM, began her collegiate career with a strong swim in the 200 butterfly, her mark of 1:53.23 jumping her to No. 6 in the national rankings as she beat Alex Walsh (1:53.89), who owns the NCAA record in the event. Grimes was back in the pool to pick up the win in the 200 backstroke, clocking 1:51.56. In her third race of the day, Grimes touched out UVA teammate Aimee Canny by one hundredth in the 200 IM, 1:55.62 to 1:55.63.
Alex Walsh claimed an individual win in the 100 fly (51.98), and Canny made a rare appearance in the 1000 freestyle, securing the win in 9:41.62. Curzan clocked 1:43.64 for the win in the 200 free, followed by Zoe Skirboll winning the 100 breaststroke (59.29). Emma Weber, the U.S. Olympic Trials runnerup in the 100-meter breast, clocked 2:09.63 over 200 yards for a dominant win. Tess Howley won the 500 free (4:43.58) while Lizzy Kaye won 1-meter diving (295.58) as well as 3-meter (335.25).
Virginia Tech’s Carmen Weiler Sastre picked up the win in the 100 back in 51.89, the only triumph for the Hokie women in individual events. She combined with Emily Claesson, Anna Summers and Athena Meneses Kovacs to win the 400 free relay in 3:16.71.
For the men, Virginia Tech has been dominant over the Cavaliers, beginning with a 1:22.93 clocking in the 200 medley relay from Youssef Ramadan, Coll Marti, Mario Molla Yanes and Brendan Whitfield. Ramadan followed that up with a win in the 100 back (45.07), and he later won the 100 fly in 44.97.
Coll Marti produced exceptional swims in both breaststroke events and the 200 IM. In the 100 breast, Coll Marti clocked a lifetime-best mark of 50.78 to move to No. 3 nationally in the event, with only Florida’s Julian Smith and Texas’ Nate Germonprez having been quicker. He followed that up with a time of 1:51.03 in the 200 breast, less than a second shy his nationally-top-ranked time of 1:50.09. Coll Marti then dominated the 200 IM as he clocked 1:42.61.
Whitfield swept the 50 free (19.29) and 100 free (42.67), and Molla Yannes clocked 1:40.78 for the win in the 200 back. Luis Dominguez topped the 200 free (1:33.61) and 500 free (4:22.27), and in men’s diving, Nathan Cox won 1-meter (359.25) and 3-meter (371.10) for the Hokies. The VT team of Ramadan, Whitfield, Molla Yanes and Dominguez took the win in the 400 free relay (2:50.61).
Virginia’s men got wins from David King in the 1000 free (9:03.43) and Hayden Bellotti in the 200 fly (1:43.69).