Luka Mijatovic added a new accolade to his growing list at age 17: national champion.
Mijatovic won the 400m freestyle at the Toyota USA Swimming National Championships in 3 minutes, 43.45 seconds, a personal best by 1.75 seconds and the fastest time ever by an American teenager.
The only swimmer younger than 18 to ever swim faster was Australian legend Ian Thorpe, according to World Aquatics’ database. Thorpe won the 2000 Olympic title in 3:40.59 at 17 after other swims in the 3:40-3:41 range before those Sydney Games.
In Friday’s final, Mijatovic overtook 19-year-old Ryan Erisman, who touched in 3:44.39 in Irvine, California. Erisman was previously the fastest U.S. teen ever with a personal best of 3:44.03.
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Last summer, Mijatovic became the youngest U.S. male swimmer at a World Championships since Michael Phelps’ first worlds in 2001.
Mijatovic, a rising high school senior from Pleasanton, California, holds 16 individual national age group records in 25-yard pools or 50-meter pools among the 13-14, 15-16 and 17-18 divisions (mostly in distance freestyle events).
Next year, he is set to matriculate at the University of Texas, where the head coach is Phelps’ career-long coach, Bob Bowman.
Then in 2028, Mijatovic turns 19 years old, which was Phelps’ age when he started racking up Olympic hardware in 2004.
The Toyota USA Swimming National Championships conclude Saturday with finals at 9 p.m. ET, live on Peacock and NBCSN.
Also Friday, Isabelle Stadden completed a sweep of the backstroke titles by taking the 100m in 58.06 seconds.
Stadden, the third-fastest woman in history in the event, was 18 hundredths under Regan Smith’s world record pace at the 50-meter mark.
Smith, whose world record is 57.13, and Australian Kaylee McKeown combine to own the 15 fastest times in history, followed by Stadden’s best of 57.55.
In the women’s 100m breaststroke, McKenzie Siroky out-touched Olympic 200m breast gold medalist Kate Douglass by two hundredths — 1:05.64 to 1:05.66.
