Hilary Caldwell gets gold at U.S. Grand Prix

AUSTIN, Tex. – World championship bronze medallist Hilary Caldwell of White Rock, B.C., won the gold medal in the women’s 200-m backstroke and Dominique Bouchard of North Bay, Ont., was second on Saturday at the U.S. Grand Prix swimming competition.

Caldwell swam almost seven seconds faster than her time in the preliminaries finishing in two minutes and 10.78 seconds. Bouchard followed in 2:12.06, Megan Romano of the U.S. was third in 2:13.16 and Meryn McCann of Burlington, Ont., fourth in 2:13.53.  Danielle Hanus of Newmarket, Ont., was also in the final and placed eighth.

‘’This event is a great preparation for the Commonwealth Games and Pan Pacific Championship trials (this April in Victoria) that are coming up,’’ said Caldwell. ‘’It gives us a good indication of where we stand heading into the next phase of training.’’

Other Canadian female finalists were: Victoria Poon and Hannah Riordan of Montreal fifth and eighth in the 50-m freestyle and Tera Van Beilen of Oakville, Ont., eighth in the 400-m individual medley.

For the men, Stephan Milosevic of Vancouver was seventh in the 200-m freestyle and Matthew Swanston of Newmarket, Ont., eighth in the 200-m backstroke.

On Friday, Canada earned three medals with Noemie Thomas of Vancouver and Audrey Lacroix of Pont-Rouge, Que., finishing 1-2 in the women’s 100-m butterfly.  Swim Ontario was third in the 4x100-m relay with Evan Van Moerkerke, Evan White, Matthew Swanston and Bryce Kwiecien-Delaney.

U.S. Grand Prix information: www.usaswimming.org

Full results: http://www.txlameetresults.com/