July 30, 2007
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa.; July 30, 2007 - Thirty members of the Penn State men's and women's swimming teams will be participating in the ConocoPhillips USA Swimming National Championships, which begin on Tuesday, July 31 and run through Saturday, August 4. The meet will be held in Indianapolis, Ind. at the IUPUI Natatorium.
A total of 16 Penn State men and 14 members of the women's team will be on hand at U.S. Nationals. The men include Sean Biedermann, Dito Calderon, Jon Cochrane, Ryan DeWeese, Max Ettore, Rob Felty, Dan Fimbianti, Josh Graham, David Kraft, Spencer Maglich, Vincent Reydams, Ben Ryan, Pat Schirk, Chris Sullivan, Sean Swanepoel and Tim Williams. On the women's side, Jessica Barnes, Clare Clemens, Molly Crispell, Kaitlyn Ferguson, Karie Haglund, Abby Hoisington, Jaime Keily, Caitlin Meehan, Kailey Morris, Michelle Myers, Kelly Nelson, Kaitlin O'Brien, Daphne Skelos and Lyndsey Smith will represent the Nittany Lions at the national meet.
Several Penn State team members are ranked in the U.S. as well as the World as having swam some of the fastest times in both the country and the world in 2007. Rankings are based on times swam in the various swimming events and are divided into three different categories: short-course yards, which is what most collegiate meets are conducted in, short-course meters, and long-course meters, which is what the U.S. National Meet will be conducted in.
Chris Sullivan is one of 16 Penn State men's swimmers that will be swimming at U.S. Nationals this week. |
A total of 12 Penn State swimmers have already qualified for next year's Olympic Trials, which will be held in Omaha, Neb. next summer. Several members of the 30-swimmer Penn State contingent headed for Indianapolis this week are in contention for a spot on a national team that will be chosen at Nationals based on performances in the finals of each event. The team picked will represent the United States at an international meet next month, the Japan International Invitation, which will be held August 21-24 in Chiba, Japan.
The U.S. Nationals will feature preliminaries beginning every morning at 9:00 a.m. with the nightly finals beginning at 6:00 p.m. each day from July 31-August 4. The meet will also feature several of the top swimmers in the country, including several Olympians. Results, as well as a rankings database can be found at the USA Swimming website, www.usaswimming.org.