March 7, 2011
VILLANOVA, Pa. - At the Indianapolis Grand Prix this past week, three Villanova women's swimmers were part of a star-studded lineup that included world class swimmers from around the country in the fourth stop on the USA Swimming Grand Prix Series. Sophomores Natalie Elphick (Durban, South Africa), Roxy Tammadge (Durban, South Africa) and Laura McGlaughlin (West Chester, Pa.) all competed in the three-day competition, which featured Olympic medalists and world record holders Michael Phelps, Ryan Lochte, Katie Hoff and Jessica Hardy.
Each of the three swimmers from the Wildcats made the most of the opportunity to achieve personal goals during the Grand Prix meet after having extremely successful seasons for Villanova this winter. Elphick and Tammadge were both tuning up for Nationals in their native South Africa this April, when they will compete for spots at the 2011 World Championships and the 2011 World University Games. McGlaughlin, meanwhile, is coming off a breakthrough season collegiately and this was her first chance to go head-to-head against some of the top women's swimmers in the country.
During the BIG EAST Championships last month, McGlaughlin established personal bests in each of her events and she picked up where she left off this past week. In the preliminaries of the 100 yard breaststroke, she placed ninth in a career-best time of 1:12.22. She lowered that mark to 1:12.18 and placed third in the `B' final of the event, in the process touching the wall a mere one-hundredth of a second under the cut time for the U.S. Olympic Trials. This is the first time in her career that McGlaughlin has met an Olympic Trials standard.
McGlaughlin next competed in the preliminaries of the 200 breast and qualified for the finals with a 10th place showing and a time of 2:38.20. She improved her new personal best time to 2:36.75 in the finals and took second in the `B' final. McGlaughlin missed the U.S. Olympic Trials cut in the 200 breast by a fraction of a second and will have another chance to achieve it at the U.S. Nationals in August. In her final race of the meet, McGlaughlin established a career best time of 2:26.67 in the 200 individual medley, in which she came in 33rd in the prelims.
The one objective for Elphick in the meet was to prepare for the South African Nationals in April with some long-course racing. She achieved that with a great deal of success and will go into her national meet ranked second in the 100 freestyle, third in the 50 free and fourth in the 200 free.
Elphick qualified for the `B' final of the 50 free in Indianapolis with a time of 26.72 during the preliminaries, then lowered her time to 26.46 in the finals en route to a sixth place overall finish. She also came in 12th in the preliminaries of the 100 free with a mark of 57.27, which she lowered to 57.15 in the finals. The latter time was three-hundredths of a second under the U.S. Olympic Trials standard in the 100 free. On the first day of the Grand Prix, Elphick came in 44th in the 200 free with a time of 2:07.60. She later swam a time trial for the 200 free and notched a time of 2:07.60.
The objective of the Grand Prix was a bit different for Tammadge, a distance swimmer, who was looking for the opportunity to get four days of long course training under her belt in preparation for the South African Nationals. Instead of wearing the "fast suit" used by the entire field, she opted to train through her events and compete in a regular practice suit.
Tammadge raced well throughout the meet and competed in the 50, 100, 200, 400 and 800 freestyle events. She suited up for the 800 free race on the final day of the meet in an effort to meet the South African Nationals qualifying time in the event. She posted a lifetime best mark with a time of 8:51.18 and came in eighth overall in a field that included Olympic and World Championship medalists Katie Hoff and Katie Ziegler. The impressive finish was a great confidence boost for Tammadge, who will be looking to make her first national team this April.
The 2011 Indianapolis Grand Prix was held from March 3-5 at the Indiana University Natatorium on the campus of Indiana-Purdue-Indianapolis (IUPUI). The meet is the fourth stop on USA Swimming's Grand Prix Series.
