×

Golden girl

O’Brien, part of a rising group of Maui female swimmers, earns a big win at the Futures Championships

Jasmine O’Brien holds up the gold medal she won at the USA Swimming Futures Championships last week during a Hawaii Swim Club workout Wednesday at Kokua Pool in Kahului. The Maui News / ROBERT COLLIAS photo

KAHULUI — Her coach compared it to an accomplishment that dates back six years.

Her training partner said it was “amazing.”

Jasmine O’Brien, as usual, giggled when asked about her victory Saturday in the 400-meter freestyle at the USA Swimming Futures Championships in Santa Clara, Calif.

“I don’t know, it’s crazy,” O’Brien, a junior at Seabury Hall, said Wednesday. “I still am kind of, like, trying to process it. It was a pretty fast meet. There were a lot of very able and talented swimmers there. So to be able to say that I got to go there and compete against all these great swimmers and come out on top is just crazy.”

O’Brien qualified for the Speedo Winter Junior Nationals-West set for Dec. 6-9 in Iowa City, Iowa, with her winning time of 4 minutes, 22.71 seconds. She also won a silver medal in the 1,500 free and a fifth-place medal in the 800 free last weekend.

Altura

“I think anything is possible — I had my hopes, obviously,” O’Brien said. “I knew I was seeded pretty well, my ranking was pretty high going into it, but I don’t know. I guess I hadn’t really thought about possibly winning, getting that second, so, yeah, I’m very, very excited.”

Junior nationals will carry O’Brien into the Maui Interscholastic League season — she set the state record in the 500-yard freestyle at the state championships in February.

“It helps me because now I know I can actually do this,” she said. “Obviously I never want to get too overconfident, too cocky — I still have to put the work in, put the effort in — but this definitely boosts my confidence.”

In the 400 free final, O’Brien beat out California’s Noelle Fimbres, who took the gold in the 1,500, by 1.32 seconds and third-place finisher Grace Tramack by 2.09.

“It was really good to watch her win,” Hawaii Swim Club teammate Kysha Altura said of O’Brien. “We were cheering on the side with our kind of co-team, Corvallis (Ore.) Swim Club — so we were all cheering, we were all freaking out. It was really amazing watching her beat everyone by a solid couple of seconds. We were really happy that someone from Hawaii, someone from Maui, could come out of nowhere and steal first place from everyone else.

Anderson

“It was really amazing.”

Altura, a senior at Maui Prep who won two state high school titles in February, was sixth in the 200 free in Santa Clara, her second trip to the meet. She and Lahaina Swim Club’s Lexi Anderson will join O’Brien in Iowa City for junior nationals — Anderson was eighth in the 100 butterfly in Santa Clara.

Hawaii Swim Club coach Reid Yamamoto said O’Brien’s victory may be the most significant for a Maui swimmer since Renny Richmond, a former Seabury Hall and University of Arizona standout, won the boys 100 butterfly at junior nationals in 2011.

“It was pretty neat to see her win that race,” Yamamoto said. “In my years of coaching, these two girls have kind of gone beyond what I have experienced, especially for my females that we’ve had at HSC. For those two to qualify and make finals (in the Futures meet), it’s pretty huge I think.

“They had great competition. … Especially to win a title at Futures, I mean I read about that kind of stuff in Swimming Magazine. For Jasmine to win and Kysha to place, it’s pretty neat for us at HSC.”

* Robert Collias is at rcollias@mauinews.com.

NEWSLETTER

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper?
     
Support Local Journalism on Maui

Only $99/year

Subscribe Today