Chris Guiliano takes on important freestyle tasks in Paris

Up-and-coming Chris Guiliano takes on important freestyle tasks in Paris

Lucas Oil Stadium’s makeshift pool deck is filled with swimmers who were unmissable stars in their respective club and high school competitions, dominating everyone they competed against. These are the elite athletes that college programs most covet.

Chris Guiliano wasn’t much of a swimmer in high school. In his sophomore year at Notre Dame, his best results were two consolation finals at the NCAA Championships. Fifteen months later, Guiliano is an Olympian, heading to Paris to represent the United States in two individual events and both freestyle relays.

Surprised that Guiliano overshadowed the show Drew Kibler And Kieran Smith to finish second in the Olympic qualifying competitions in the 200m freestyle? That can be forgiven, because Guiliano finished 30th at the US Nationals last year with a time of 1:49.59. He came to Indianapolis as the 29th seed with a personal best of 1:48.75. Three personal bests later, his time of 1:45.38 puts him just outside the top 10 in the world rankings in this discipline.

“Honestly, I didn’t really know what to expect from this meet when I came into this meet, but I think the more I swim this meet, the more I get used to it,” Guiliano said. “I think we’ve seen that throughout this year. I haven’t been running like crazy or anything during the season, but I’ve tried different ways to swim it and really pull it off.”

Sure, but this swimmer has top speed and power like few others. At the NCAA Championships, he swam the 50-yard freestyle in just 18.43 seconds. Many of these swimmers are strong in the 200-yard dash, which can be run at an extremely high pace, but not in the long-distance version of the race. Maintaining maximum pace over four laps in a long-distance pool is nearly impossible. Most who try this strategy inevitably get weaker. Many swimmers who excel in the 200-yard dash, including Jack AlexDon’t even bother swimming the 200 meter freestyle.

But Guiliano swam like a seasoned 200m swimmer, using his natural speed to finish quickly but saving some for the final stretch, where he clocked the second fastest time in the field at 27.15 seconds. To make that kind of improvement in a season, you have to gain strength, skill and master race strategy, and that was on display Monday night.

His results in the 100-meter freestyle were more predictable before this competition, as Guiliano had already made a huge leap in the event at last year’s US Nationals. Before the competition, he had never jumped below 49, and then he finished an unexpected second place with – this might sound familiar – 47.98. He won two relay silver medals in his international debut.

Photo courtesy: Peter H. Bick

Months later, in the midst of a brilliant junior season, he posted a time of 47.49 in the time trial after the ACC Championships. At the NCAA Championships, he posted three top-five individual finishes and helped the Fighting Irish to three top-10 relay finishes, an unprecedented achievement for a school with no national swimming success history.

Now he is on his way to Paris for a second event after winning the 100 m freestyle final over Jack Alex. His chances of winning an individual medal in the 100m freestyle are greater than in the 200m freestyle, as he currently holds the fourth fastest time in the world at 47.25 and has also positioned himself as a key member of a U.S. men’s 400m freestyle relay team that has legitimate ambitions of a third consecutive gold medal and perhaps even breaking the 16-year-old world record of 3:08.24.

There have been several surprising qualifiers for the US team this week in Indianapolis, but none have made the leap from being a relative unknown a year ago to being a central figure in the American team heading to Paris.

“This is a dream come true, being like a kid,” Guiliano said after qualifying for the first time Monday night. “I enjoyed that moment and saw a few of my teammates in the crowd and that really made it worth it. They made the short trip from school and that just meant the world to me.”