Bel Air's Gold Medal Winner Advances To Semifinals In 200 IM

TOKYO — Bel Air-native Chase Kalisz competed for the first time as a gold-medal winner on Wednesday at the Summer Olympics in Tokyo.

The swimmer, who captured gold in the 400-meter individual medley on Saturday night (U.S. time), returned to the pool for the prelims of his other event, the 200-meter individual medley, on Wednesday morning (U.S. time). Kalisz won Heat 5 of the 200 IM with a time of 1:57.38, and is one of 16 swimmers to advance to Wednesday night's (U.S. time) two semifinals.

The 200 IM semifinals are scheduled to take place at 11:08 p.m. Eastern on Wednesday night, with the top eight swimmers advancing to the final, which is scheduled 10:16 p.m. Eastern Thursday on NBC.

In the prelims, Kalisz had the fourth-best time behind the USA's Michael Andrew (1:56.40), Switzerland's Jérémy Desplanches (1:56.89) and New Zealand's Lewis Clareburt (1:57.27).

The gold in the 200 IM has been won by Baltimore's Michael Phelps in each of the last four Olympics (Athens 2004, Beijing 2008, London 2012 and Rio de Janeiro 2016). Phelps retired in 2016 and now is a commentator for NBC Sport's swimming coverage.

Kalisz, 27, won the first U.S. swimming medal in Tokyo this past weekend, capturing gold in the 400 IM (4:09.42). Fellow countryman Jay Litherland won the silver (4:10.28). Kalisz and Litherland previously were teammates at the University of Georgia.