The 2021 TYR Pro Swim Series at San Antonio concluded, seeing Katie Ledecky win her fourth event of the meet, while Ryan Murphy, Simone Manuel, and Michael Andrew earned their second.

The first event of the night was the decorated women’s 100m backstroke, which featured six U.S. National Team members, the current and former world-record holder and the reigning Olympic silver medalist in the event. The race lived up to its hype, coming down to a single hundredth of a second separating Olivia Smoliga (59.49) and Regan Smith (59.50).

“I get so much confidence from them,” Smoliga said of the talented field. “It’s just March and there’s a lot of work to be done, but this means a lot to me to race them. I get to play around with strategies and find what I want to do when the end of the season comes around.”

The men’s field followed suit with an impressive performance, as Murphy completed the meet’s backstroke sweep with a 53.56 swim to touch first. The win gave Murphy his second backstroke sweep in his past three TYR Pro Swim Series competitions.

Following the backstroke event was the 200m breaststroke, where Annie Lazor and Nic Fink captured wins in 2:24.45 and 2:11.92. The wins gave Lazor the 13^th TYR Pro Swim Series win of her career, while Fink’s victory was his 11^th.

Sprint-freestyle powerhouse Simone Manuel showcased her talent in the 50m freestyle, going 24.70 to touch first.

“It’s nice to be back and just to shake the cobwebs off,” Manuel said. “It’s definitely a different experience then just racing back at Stanford with my teammates. It’s exciting to be back in this environment and it’s nice to race some of the other top U.S. competitors.”

For the men’s event, Santo Condorelli took the title in 22:49, just out-touching Nathan Adrian, who finished in 22.56.

A pair of U.S. National Team members claimed the 200m I.M., as Madisyn Cox claimed the women’s title in 2:10.84 while Andrew won the men’s event in 1:58.05. Both swims were over a second ahead of the next-closest finisher.

“That’s what I came here for, it’s the people, the quality of people and the quality of competition,” Cox said of the competition field. “I’m so grateful to be here with such incredible swimmers.”

“The biggest thing we’re trying to work on is closing that last 50 with more speed,” Andrew explained. “I was at 30.0 this evening, and 29.6 this morning, so there’s some things we have to work on, some endurance, but overall I’m happy to go 1:58 and have a much better swim.”

Competition wrapped up with the 800m freestyle, where Ledecky claimed her fourth win in as many days, going 8:13.64 to finish over 12 seconds ahead of the field.

“I was happy to end on a pretty good note in the 800,” Ledecky said. “I think there’s a lot to take away from the first time competing again in this kind of setting. It was just good practice to get on a plane and travel and to get back into that competition routine.”

In the men’s event, Marwan El-Kamash recorded the win in 7:58.33. The win gave him the fifth TYR Pro Swim Series win of his career.

The TYR Pro Swim Series will return in April 2021, with details to be released Monday, March 8.