Yesterday, Saturday, December 16th 2022, a Caymanian, 20-year-old Jordan Crooks, became the fastest swimmer in the world, winning the World Championship in the “blue riband” event, the 50 metres Freestyle. My oldest son captured the moment well with the image above that he, himself a past Cayman swim team captain and Commonwealth Games and World Championships swimmer for Cayman, posted.
I’ve been actively involved in Cayman Swimming for well over 20 years, so to see this live on my TV was a moment that moved me immensely, with so much happiness and pride for Jordan, his family and the whole Cayman Swimming community 🇰🇾
It is quite astonishing to see our tiny islands, population 66,000, excel on the world stage as Jordan did, yet it is not an accident, it is not happenstance, it comes as part of a progression (albeit a massive leap taken by Jordan and Jordan alone at this stage!)
Allow me to share a little history on Cayman swimming, from a Twitter thread I shared with the Twitter swimming community yesterday to “download” all of the thoughts and memories that flooded forward for me in the hours after Jordan’s win.
A 🧵 on Cayman Swimming history
On Saturday 16th December 2022, Jordan Crooks became the fastest swimmer on the planet, winning the 50m free World Championship.
An astonishing achievement by the young man, yet how did our small island nation of 66,000 people find one of our own on top of the podium, at the top of world swimming?
2. The first pivotal moment was when Cayman was given our first public pool, thanks to the Lions Club and their foresight.
In 1986 the Lions Aquatic Centre opened a 25m outdoor pool. From this, a learn-to-swim programme blossomed, and then a competitive programme
3. A few years later, Cayman started to take teams to the CARIFTA age group swimming championships that, each year, bring together the top 11-17 year old swimmers from across the Caribbean.
4. In 1996 Cayman’s first ever CARIFTA medallist was 12-year-old Landon von Kanel, who won both the 200m and 400m Free events. Tragically, Landon died in a car accident in 2001. In 2002 his family created the Landon von Kanel award for any swimmer who replicated his achievement.
5. After steady progress at CARIFTA, the 2003 team dominated, led by Andrew Mackay, who became the first Caymanian to reach an Olympic qualifying time.
In 2004, Andrew, Heather Roffey and Shaune Fraser all swam for Cayman at the Athens Olympics
6. The following two Olympic cycles saw Shaune Fraser and his brother Brett blossom as top NCAA swimmer, both swimming at Beijing 2008 and both reaching the semis of the 200 Free at London 2012.
7. After London 2012 Cayman Swimming hired our first-ever Technical Director, Ian Armiger, who set in place a long-term strategy for the development of the sport at all levels.
8. Throughout the period from 2012 to 2022 Cayman saw more and more swimmers (and technical officials) represent our small country at major international meets, with Cayman cemented as a CARIFTA powerhouse through careful stewardship across the swimming community.
9. Over the last decade or so, more and more Caymanian swimmers have gone on to swim at colleges and universities in the USA and beyond.
10. In 2021, one of those student-athletes shocked everyone in his freshman year. This was Jordan Crooks, who became the fastest-ever freshman swimmer (yes, even faster than one Caleb Dressel), top class form he carried into the short course World Championships this week.11. At these championships, Jordan has swum the meet of his life (so far, as he is only 20!), starting the final in Lane 4 with the fastest time by some 0.45 seconds. That said, what an amazing achievement to take on board that pressure and execute, winning gold!
12. Given that male freestyle sprinters often don’t peak until their mid to late 20s, at 20 years old we can all hope to see much, much more from Jordan Crooks of 🇰🇾
13. PS 1 of 2: Jordan started to truly excel in the last year or so, prior to which he was excellent, though not a standout Caribbean swimmer. His younger sister Jillian, however? Watch out world! If anything, she has even more potential than her brother and she is only 16.
14. PS 2 of 2: That Landon von Kanel award I mentioned before? In the race where Jordan Crooks won Gold, Bronze was taken by Dylan Carter, a fellow Carifta swimmer and one who was a star from a very young age. In fact, in 2009, Dylan won the Landon von Kanel award. Here is Jordan, Jillian and Dylan after the 50m Free award ceremony (photo from Jillian’s FB page)
