5 top swimmers at the 2023 Women’s Ivy League Championships

The 2023 Women's Ivy League Championships took place from February 15 to February 18. Many female swimmers have emerged as the prospects of the tournament.

Princeton's Nikki Venema and Harvard's Samantha Shelton were among the top performers in the tournament.

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Top 5 swimmers at the 2023 Women's Ivy League Championships

America's collegiate-level competition, which welcomes the top eight private universities in the northeastern United States, is the Ivy League Championships.

In the recently concluded Women's Ivy League, many emerging female swimmers registered their names in the history books. Here is the list of the top 5 female swimmers,

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#1 Nikki Venema

Venema earned the maximum 96 points by winning the 50 free on Day 1, the 100 fly on Day 2, and the 100 free on Day 3. She also contributed to winning the 200 medley relay, 800 free relay, 200 free relay, and 400 free relay teams. She competed in the 200 free relay (Ivy League and DeNunzio Pool), 200 medley relay (Ivy League and DeNunzio Pool), and 800 free relay teams that broke records (DeNunzio Pool).

Nikki Venema previously shared the top points title with teammate Ellie Marquardt, who won the 500, 1000, and 1650 freestyle, when she won the 50 free, 100 free, and 200 freestyles as a freshman at the 2020 championships.

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#2 Samantha Shelton

Samantha Shelton, a senior for the Crimson, won the 200 backstroke event in 1:54.42, barely off her previous record of 1:54.01. Shelton took the lead after the first 50 yards, and although she turned in second place at the 100-yard mark, she swiftly returned and restored her advantage to defeat Anya Mostek, a freshman classmate.

With a time of 1:55.66, Samantha Shelton won the 200 backstroke by more than a second. She also won the career-high points swimmer title after scoring 348 points across four Ivy championship meetings.

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#3 Charlotte Martinkus

With her victory on the 3-meter board, freshman Charlotte Martinkus secured the Tigers their third victory of the competition. Given that she won the 1-meter board earlier in the match, she now has a clean sweep in the diving event.

Elizabeth Miclau, Nina Janmyr, and Remi Edvalson from Harvard finished 2-3-4 behind her, with their teammate Evie Geier coming in eighth. Miclau, Janmyr, and Edvalson likewise placed 2-3-4 in the 1-meter, but in a somewhat different sequence; Edvalson finished second, and Miclau fourth.

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#4 Anna Kalandadze

Penn's Anna Kalandadze competed in the 1650 freestyle after dropping a significant lifetime best to win the 500 freestyle earlier in the event. Her winning time of 15:53.88 set a new personal best. It beat Alicia Aemisegger's record, which had held since 2009, by 3.46 seconds and established a new Ivy League record. Kalandadze triumphed by more than 25 seconds.

Like the 500 free, Kalandadze guided the Quakers to a 1-2-3 sweep, with Sydney Bergstrom and Anna Moehm taking second and third, respectively.

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#5 Margaux McDonald

Princeton's Margaux McDonald had a fantastic outing in the women's 200-meter backstroke finals. Ava Franks, a Yale sophomore, held the lead for most of the race and finished in front of the pack by more than a second and a half when she turned the 150-meter line in 1:35.57. In a final 50 split of 36.12, the field's slowest, she suffered from that effort. Margaux McDonald made a tremendous comeback over the final 50, splitting the discs at a field-best 34.22.