KAZAN, Russia – Three Golden Bears collected medals at the FINA World Championships Wednesday, with Missy Franklin earning a bronze medal in the 200-meter freestyle, and Ryan Murphy and Katie McLaughlin helping the U.S. team to a silver medal in the mixed 4x100-meter medley relay.
Halfway through the meet, Cal swimmers have earned six total medals – three silver and three bronze.
Franklin claimed her first individual medal at the meet when she was timed in 1:55.59, which was 0.33 seconds behind 200 free winner Katie Ladecky (1:55.16). Italy's Federica Pellegrini, the world-record holder in the event, won silver.
“Based on my results from this meet, I know my times have not been where I want them to be, but come next year, it’s not going to matter,” Franklin told USA Swimming. “I’m going to do what I will do this next year, and be where I want to be come (Olympic) Trials.
“I felt really good going into the 100 backstroke yesterday. My speed just wasn’t there, so you get out, you do your best and you’ve got to move on from that. My 200s are feeling really, really good, so I’m really hoping that translates over to my 200 backstroke, and we’ll see what happens in my 100 free tomorrow. It should be really tough and really fun as well, but one thing at a time.”
In the mixed medley relay, where each team had two men and two women swimmers in the lineup, the U.S. set a world record in qualifying. Murphy, a junior for the Bears, led off with a backstroke leg time of 52.18, which was faster than the winning time in the 100 back final. Murphy is swimming the 200 back only as an individual event.
In the relay final, Murphy again led off, this time in 53.31, and McLaughlin, who will be a freshman at Cal in the fall, handled the butterfly leg in 57.56. As a team, the Americans finished in 3:43.27 behind Great Britain, which lowered the world record to 3:41.71.
In other races, McLaughlin qualified for the women’s 200 back final in the fifth position (2:07.52), while Nathan Adrian, the 2012 Olympic gold medalist in the event, reached the men’s 100 free final with the fifth-best time of the semifinals (48.61). In addition, Cal alum Tom Shields placed eighth in the men’s 200 fly final in 1:56.17.
Other Bears in the water included Martin Liivamagi (Estonia), who was 26th in 200 individual medley qualifying (2:03.21) and Noemie Thomas, who swam the butterfly leg in the preliminaries for Canada in the mixed medley relay.
