USA Swimming Revises 18 & Under Spring Cup Standards to Match Sectionals Cuts

By Braden Keith on SwimSwam

USA Swimming has released revised time standards for the 2024 18 & Under Spring Cup. The new time standards are equal to the 2023 Sectionals time standards.

A spokesperson from USA Swimming says that the standards were “adjusted in conjunction with the hosts to reflect the changes we are seeing between 2021 utilization and 2024 utilization.”

While USA Swimming declined to share registration numbers for the meets, they did say that because there are generally more long course racing opportunities for this year than there were in 2021, they “decided to relax the standards to allow more athletes the opportunity to race in these meets.” That indicates lower registration numbers than expected for the 2024 events.

The meets, which were first envisioned during the COVID-19 pandemic to give swimmers more long course racing opportunities in the leadup to the Olympics, will take place at three regional locations around the US: one in Elkhart, Indiana; one in Fort Lauderdale, Florida; and one in Mesa, Arizona. All three locations are scheduled for May 2-5.

Each of the three sites are due to be capped at “approximately 800 swimmers.” The entry deadline is April 23, 2024 at Noon Mountain Time, and the qualification period opened on December 1, 2022.

• See the original qualifying standards here.
• See the revised qualifying standards here.

The new standards are around 2.5-3.5% slower than the old standards.

Revised 18 & Under Spring Cup Standards:

SwimSwam: USA Swimming Revises 18 & Under Spring Cup Standards to Match Sectionals Cuts