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By Emily Sampl//Contributor | Saturday, December 7, 2019
Meet records continued to fall Friday at the Toyota U.S. Open, as Melanie Margalis, Katie Ledecky, Torri Huske, Townley Haas and Phoebe Bacon all set new marks on the third night of competition in Atlanta.
Margalis opened finals by breaking her second U.S. Open meet record in as many days, this time in the 400m IM. She made up huge ground on the second half of the breaststroke leg, moving from sixth to second and then up to first for a final time of 4:37.34, taking a second off Katie Hoff’s 2006 record of 4:38.38. Ally McHugh passed Emma Weyant for second, 4:38.09 to 4:39.64.
After placing 11th in prelims with a 2:00.12, Ledecky swam in the B final of the women’s 200m free and ended up posting the fastest time of the night in 1:56.24, a meet record. Allison Schmitt, the 2012 Olympic champion in the women’s 200m free, officially got the win in the A final with a 1:56.47. Hong Kong’s Siobhan Haughey moved up a spot from her third seed to take second in 1:57.14, with Simone Manuel in third at 1:57.21.
Sixteen-year-old Torri Huske out-raced veteran Kelsi Dahlia to the wall in the women’s 100m fly final, touching in 57.48 and clearing the meet record of 57.53, set by Marie Wattel in 2017. Dahlia wasn’t far behind in 57.96, while Amanda Kendall took third in 58.25.
In the men’s 200m free, 2016 Olympian Townley Haas dropped almost two seconds from his prelim swim to take the win in 1:45.92, well under the meet record of 1:46.23 set by The Netherlands’ Pieter van den Hoogenband way back in 2005. Zach Apple moved up two places from his performance this morning to finish second in 1:46.76, ahead of Fernando Scheffer’s 1:47.31.
A pair of 17-year-olds put on a show in the women’s 100m back final, with Phoebe Bacon upsetting world record-holder Regan Smith in the final by just .05, 58.63 to 58.68. Both swimmers cleared Smith’s meet record from prelims, which stood at 58.96. Olivia Smoliga, a 2016 Olympian in the event, moved up two spots to take third in 59.60.
Chase Kalisz joined Margalis in sweeping the individual medley events with his second win of the meet in the men's 400m IM. Kalisz led from start to finish en route to a 4:13.07. Carson Foster, who finished second to Kalisz in the 200m IM last night, gave him a good run but settled for second in 4:14.76. Jay Litherland, a 2016 Olympian in the 400m IM, took third in 4:18.58.
World record-holder and defending Olympic champion Lilly King raced to victory in the women’s 100m breast, out-distancing runner-up Annie Lazor by almost a second, 1:05.65 to 1:06.63. Molly Hannis, a 2016 Olympian in the 200m breast, came in third at 1:07.24.
A trio of swimmers dipped under the 1:00 mark in the men’s 100m breast final, with Kazakhstan’s Olympic gold medalist Dmitriy Balandin leading the way in 59.36. Top qualifier Andrew Wilson couldn’t quite match his meet record of 59.28 from prelims as he wound up second in 59.54, just in front of Rio bronze medalist Cody Miller (59.92).
In other finals, Luis Martinez topped the men’s 100m fly final in 52.00, ahead of Jack Conger (52.26) and Iago Amaral (52.42). Markus Thormeyer got to the wall first in the men’s 100m back final with a 53.94, comfortably in front of Christopher Reid (54.27) and Jacob Pebley (54.39).
The meet concludes tomorrow with prelims beginning at 10am EST and finals at 7pm EST. Make sure to follow usaswimming.org for live results and webcast.