Quance Upset by Wagner in 400 Medley

Kristine Quance wore a scowl. Alexis Larsen was beaming. Allison Wagner showed no emotion. Care to pick the order of finish of the women’s 400-meter individual medley Saturday in the Janet Evans Invitational at USC?

Wagner was first, upsetting Quance, the defending national champion from Northridge. Larsen, Quance’s CLASS Aquatics teammate, took third in a career-best time.

The usually mild-mannered Quance went down with a fight, clocking a career-best 65-second split on the last leg, the freestyle, but she could not close the gap forged by Wagner’s outstanding butterfly and backstroke segments.

Wagner finished in 4 minutes 49.31 seconds to Quance’s 4:51.54 and Larsen’s 4:57.42.

“It felt terrible,” Quance said. “I don’t know what it was. My legs were really tired. I don’t like to make excuses, though. It’s still a good time and I know I’ll swim a lot faster at nationals (July 26-30 in Austin, Tex.).”

CLASS Aquatics Coach Bud McAllister believes the loss will burn inside Quance and motivate her to train more intensely.

Larsen, 16, was thrilled just to be able to see Quance during the breaststroke leg, much less outlast Olympian Janie Wagstaff, the fourth-place finisher.

“It hurt, but it still felt good,” she said. “I felt strong.”

In the 200 breaststroke, raced prior to the 400 individual medley, Quance took the lead from the outset and won easily in 2:35.35.

Swimming Notes

Among the other area swimmers to place in the top eight Saturday: Rebecca Gilman, 13, of Buenaventura finished seventh in the 200 freestyle in an unshaved/unrested best of 2:09.48. Sarah Nichols, 15, of Conejo-Simi Aquatics followed in 2:09.62. Erika Salazar of Conejo-Simi took seventh in the 200 breaststroke in 2:45.33 and Agoura’s Jason Stelle, representing the Trojan Swim Club, placed eighth in the 400 individual medley in 4:41.80.