NANTERRE, France — Alex Shackell is not only the first Carmel girl to be an Olympic medalist in swimming. Records show she is the second Indiana girl still in high school to be a swim medalist.
The United States finished second to Australia in the 4x200-meter freestyle Thursday night at the Paris Olympics.
Shackell, 17, entering her senior year, was not one of the four swimmers in the final. Because she swam in prelims, she earns the same silver medal.
Australia won the gold with an Olympic record of 7:38.08.
The Americans, who crept close on Katie Ledecky’s third leg, were second in 7:40.86. It was Ledecky’s 13th Olympic medal, most ever by an American woman in any sport and second overall only to Michael Phelps’ 28.
Earlier in the night, as the youngest finalist in the field, Shackell finished sixth in the 200-meter butterfly.
You could say it took 28 years for the Shackell family to get on an Olympic podium.
Alex’s father, Nick, was on Great Britain’s 4x100-meter medley relay team at Atlanta in 1996. The British seemingly qualified for the final with one of the fastest times, but the team was disqualified.
So no Olympic medal for Team Shackell.
Now there is one.
On Saturday, Shackell’s brother, Aaron, also made an Olympic final, finishing eighth in the 400 freestyle.
Unlike at previous Olympics, Alex was able to stand on top on the podium with all of the relay swimmers: Claire Weinstein, Paige Madden, Ledecky, Erin Gemmell, Simone Manuel and Indiana University’s Anna Peplowski.
It was Ledecky who encouraged Shackell at last year’s World Championships, giving her a poker chip that said, “You got this,” right before the Carmel swimmer was to anchor Team USA in the 4x200 freestyle relay,
“She lit up as she read it,” Ledecky wrote in her recently released memoir, “Just Add Water.”
In the 200 butterfly, Canada’s Summer McIntosh set an Olympic record of 2:03.03 for her third Paris medal and second gold.
Regan Smith took silver, lowering her own American record to 2:03.84. Defending champion Zhang Yufei of China was bronze medalist in 2:05.09.
Shackell, fourth at 100 meters in 59.97, finished in 2:07.73. Of six swims at the Olympic Trials and Olympics, it was her slowest time.
She said it would motivate her ahead of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
“Honestly, I never really got into my stroke in that race,” she said. “I think I was too focused on other people around me. I should have just swam my own race, like I did yesterday.”
Shackell was fifth out of semifinals in 2:06.46, nearly swimming stroke-for-stroke with Zhang.
In 4x200 free relay prelims, Shackell anchored and had the slowest time of the four Americans, 1:59.47. Asked whether that tired her for the 200 butterfly, she said:
“Maybe. Probably. I don’t know. I’m not going to use that as my excuse. I had enough time to recover.”
It was the second medal in three nights for Carmel, following Drew Kibler’s silver, also in the 4x200 freestyle relay.
Two other high school girls, Samantha Peszek of Cathedral and Bridget Sloan of Tri-West, were on the U.S. gymnastics team that won a silver medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
Before Shackell's feat Thursday, the only other Indiana high school medalist was Fort Wayne Snider’s Sharon Wichman. Then 16, she won gold in the 200 breaststroke and bronze in the 100 breaststroke at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics.
Judy Roberts, 18, swam the 100 freestyle at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics weeks after graduating from Broad Ripple High School.
Seventeen-year-old Kathy Ellis, won four medals at the Tokyo Olympics in October 1964. However, she had already graduated from North Central High School.
Jennifer Hooker, then 15, of Bloomington South swam in the heats for the gold-winning team in the 4x100 freestyle relay at the 1976 Montreal Olympics. Under rules then, only swimmers in the final were eligible for medals.
Contact WTHR correspondent David Woods at dwoods1411@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter: @DavidWoods007.
(Editor's Note: This story has been corrected to reflect Sharon Wichman also won medals as an Indiana high school student.)