Mission Viejo Meet of Champions : Evans Cruises to 800-Meter Freestyle Victory

As one of the world’s best swimmers, Janet Evans of Placentia sometimes has a lot of waiting to do.

Thursday, she waited 200 meters before making her winning move in the 800-meter freestyle race at the Mission Viejo Meet of Champions. And then she bobbed in the water for eight seconds before any of her competitors finished.

“I told Janet to go her first 200 meters and see if anybody is pushing her, and if they’re not, to take the race to them,” said Bud McAllister, coach of the Fullerton Aquatics Swim Team.

Swimming six of the seven 100-meter splits within 7/10 of a second of each other, Evans cruised to victory with a time of 8 minutes 40.05 seconds in the Marguerite Recreation Center pool.

Tami Bruce of the San Jose Aquatic team came in more than eight seconds later to finish second with a time of 8:48.87, and Lesley Daland, who was not competing with any club team, was third in 8:48.96. Daniel Jorgensen, who swims for Rancho Bernardo, won the men’s race in 8:14.59.

The 800 meters was Thursday’s only scheduled event. The rest of the competition begins today with preliminaries starting at 9:30 a.m. The finals are scheduled for 5 p.m.

“I really didn’t have anybody to push me, so I just had to swim on my own,” said Evans, a 15-year-old junior at El Dorado High School. “I do better when I have competition.”

Said McAllister: “I don’t think there’s anybody who can catch Janet in the second half of a race at 800 meters or over. But she does need somebody to set a fast pace for her first 400 meters.”

After the race’s first 100 meters, that person seemed to be Mission Viejo’s Debbie Babashoff, the event’s defending champion. Babashoff was a body length faster than Evans last year. But this season, Evans has defeated her twice, winning the U.S Open at Orlando in December and the U.S. Shortcourse Nationals at Boca Raton, Fla., in March.

After the first 100 meters, Babashoff trailed Evans by less than 2/10s of a second. As the race continued, though, Babashoff fell off the pace. She finished eighth, and her time of 8:59.18 was more than 15 seconds slower than her winning time last year.

“I’m kind of tired right now,” said Babashoff, 17, a junior at Fountain Valley High School. “I had two finals today and another one tomorrow. I’ve really been studying a lot.”

Said Terry Stoddard, Mission Viejo Nadadores coach: “We didn’t expect her finals would give her so much trouble in the pool. Hopefully, she’ll bounce back.”

Neither Evans nor Babashoff was close to her best mark. McAllister says Evans’ best is 8:32.7; Babashoff’s best is an 8:34 at the World Games in Madrid last August. Both swimmers aim to peak for the U.S. Swimming Longcourse National Championships July 27-31 at Clovis, Calif.

Swimming smoothly and consistently, Jorgensen won the men’s race, edging Mission Viejo’s Marius Podkoscielny (8:14.94) by almost a half-second. Jorgensen’s time was more than four seconds slower than last year, when he won the race.

“I was expecting a good race,” said Jorgensen, one of many swimmers using the meet as a tuneup race. “This meet gives me some guidelines for what I need to do now and in the future.”