BUENOS AIRES — Alabama swimmer Rhyan White earned Team USA’s first swimming medal of the 2018 Youth Olympic Games Monday. The freshman from Herriman, Utah, earned a bronze in the 100-meter backstroke during the second day of the games in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
White had the fastest reaction time of the race at .58 of a second and was second at the halfway point before Russia’s Daria Vaskina moved past both White and Australia’s Kaylee McKeown, who took the silver.
White shattered the University of Alabama 100-meter backstroke record with her swim in finals, stopping the clock in a time of 1:00.60. She was less than two-tenths of a second behind Vaskina and three-hundredths of a second from McKeown.
White will also swim the 50-meter and 200-meter backstrokes at these games, which feature athletes aged 15 to 18.
Fellow Tide freshman Kalia Antoniou is competing for her native Cyprus at the Youth Olympics. After taking 12th in the preliminaries, she moved up two spots in the semifinals of the 100-meter freestyle to finish 10th overall with a time of 56.63. She is the second alternate heading into finals.
Antoniou also has two more events left in Argentina. She is slated to compete in the 50-meter freestyle and will join White in the 50-meter backstroke.
