SWIMMING / L.A. INVITATIONAL : Quance Attracts Some Attention
Bud McAllister thought his bank account was safe.
He told Kristine Quance that if she broke the 2-minute 30-second mark in the 200-meter breaststroke Saturday he would buy her a car.
Quance, 16, of Northridge, let McAllister, the CLASS Aquatics coach, off the hook with a Los Angeles Invitational meet record 2:30.10 at USC, but she gave her competitors something to worry about with the sixth-fastest time in the world this year.
It eclipsed the meet record of 2:31.11, set by Canadian Alison Higson in 1988.
Considering that Quance is in the middle of a heavy training period in preparation for the Pan Pacific Games next month, McAllister told her before the race that he would be happy with a 2:35.
That is when she asked him what he would do if she broke 2:30.
“I had no idea she could go that fast,” McAllister said. “I have to learn to watch my mouth.”
The last time a swimmer took McAllister up on a dare he had to shave his mustache. That was in 1987, when McAllister coached Janet Evans at Fullerton Aquatics. Evans’ first world record spelled the end of McAllister’s mustache.
“The one thing they (Evans and Quance) have in common is that you can never predict what they will do,” McAllister said.
Quance’s 2:34.27 in the morning preliminaries was her fastest time without an extended rest from training, but it gave no indication of what was to come.
“I don’t really know where that came from,” Quance said. “I felt really good the whole way. It is a nice thing to go that fast in the middle of a training season.”
Meet records also were broken in the men’s 200 breaststroke (Australian Philip Rogers, 2:17.46) and in the men’s and women’s 400 individual medley by Dave Wharton and Summer Sanders, respectively.
Wharton, the silver medalist in the 1988 Olympic Games in the 400 individual medley, took control on the third leg, the breaststroke, after dueling Matt Hooper through the butterfly and backstroke legs.
His 4:27.30 was just under the record 4:27.79 held by Canadian Jon Kelly since 1988. It was Wharton’s fastest unrested and unshaved time.
Sanders broke Evans’ 1987 mark of 4:49.43 with a 4:49.41, the 13th fastest time in the world this year.
“That is a good time for now,” said Sanders, who won the consolation finals of the 200 breaststroke 25 minutes earlier.
At 28, Steve Crocker was the oldest man in one of the fastest men’s 50 freestyle fields ever assembled in the United States. Crocker beat the youngsters with a 23.07-second swim.
The fourth-fastest man ever in the 50, Crocker touched ahead of world record-holder Tom Jager and Matt Biondi, the second-fastest 50 freestyler in history.