Cal Poly’s Peter Kline qualified Friday at the Santa Clara International Meet for the Olympic trials in the 400-meter individual medley.
In prelims, the freshman from Fresno – who entered ranked 28th with a mark of 4 minutes, 35.77 seconds – touched the wall in 4:30.37 seconds.
Kline, who was slotted ninth in the prelims’ fastest heat, came in third, two behind six-time 2004 Gold Medalist Michael Phelps, but sat out the finals to save himself for the 200 backstroke.
For Kline, competing with Phelps was enough of an honor in itself.
“It hurt pretty bad toward the end,” Kline said. “But Phelps being there helped. Having someone way out in front of me that I wanted to catch, even if I wasn’t going to, was big. I figured if I could race anyone in the world, it may as well have been him. It was fun racing the best.”
This past season, Kline – a CollegeSwimming.com Mid-Major All-American honorable mention – set a trio of individual school records and contributed to two record-breaking relay teams.
The Olympic trials are held in Omaha, Neb. from June 29 through July 6.
Kline said he’ll try to build up endurance in the near future before taking a prolonged, three-week resting period before the trials.