2024 U.S. Olympic Selection
There's still one day left to enter SwimSwam's 2024 U.S. Olympic Trials Pick'em Contest, but we've already received 610 responses and counting. In this article, we'll look at some notable trends among the athletes selected.
My favorite pick 'ems is surprisingly Katie Ledecky In long distance freestyle events, Bobby Finke In the men's 800m freestyle, he received 604 of 606 votes, accounting for 99.7% of the total votes. Other event winners included Ledecky in the 400m (98.9%), 800m (99.5%) and 1500m freestyle (99.3%), and Finke in the 1500m freestyle (99.3%). Regan Smith in the women's 200 fly (98.3%) and 200 backstroke (97.9%). Katie Grimes Women's 400m Individual Medley (97.9%)
The lowest seed that will give you an advantage in the tournament is Caleb Dresselwas seeded 5th in the 50m freestyle, but was predicted to win by 60.9% of respondents. He was also seeded 3rd in the 100m butterfly, and was predicted to win by 75.5% of respondents, but was not a favorite to win the 100m freestyle. The favorite to win goes to the top seed. Jack Alexiewas picked by 58.7% of the public to win the event, but Dressel received 24% of the first-place votes in the event, the second-most of any swimmer, and he was also the favorite to win second place individually.
The other two events where the top seeds were not the favorites to win were the men's 200 butterfly, 200 individual medley and 400 freestyle. In the 200 butterfly, No. 2 seed Carson Foster received a majority of the votes Thomas HeilmannHe had a faster best time than Foster and finished higher than him at the 2023 World Championships. Foster was also selected by 75.9% of voters to place first in the 200-meter individual medley. Shane CasasIn the 400m freestyle, the second seed and current Olympic bronze medalist Kieran Smith He received more first place votes than top-seeded David Johnston.
nevertheless Lily King He has been America's top breaststroker since 2016 (excluding 2021). Lydia Jacoby Despite winning the Olympic gold medal, voters seem less confident in her winning the 100m breaststroke, where she received only 62.3% of the first-place votes, the second-lowest percentage of any women's favorite. The lowest percentage of votes for a women's favorite was in the 50m freestyle, where she received 54.2% of the first-place votes. Kate Douglas to win. But it's fair to speculate that this result stemmed in part from skepticism that she would actually swim the race.
The events with the most open Olympic spots are for the second-place individual spots in the women's 100 backstroke, women's 200 butterfly, and men's 800 freestyle. The voting is nearly evenly split. Katherine Berkoff and Claire Curzan Berkoff came in second out of 100, just beating Karzan. Alex Shackell Johnson received the majority of the second-place votes (45.9%) in the 200 butterfly, and many voters are confident that Johnson, who received 60.6% of the second-place votes, will be selected over Paris in the 800 freestyle.
The 2024 U.S. Olympic Swimming Trials will be held June 15-24 in Indianapolis, Indiana. Follow SwimSwam for all of our coverage of the meet.
