Swimming news - Sjostrom and Le Clos star to take victory at inaugural International Swimming League

ByJames Gray

Updated 06/10/2019 at 22:18 GMT

Olympic stars Chad le Clos and Sarah Sjostrom led the points-scoring as their Energy Standard team took victory in the first ever International Swimming League meet.

Sjostrom became the first ever ISL MVP as she picked up 54 points in total over the weekend to help Energy to a convincing victory.

By dominating the double-points events such as the relays and skins, they ran out 96-point winners, well clear of the Cali Condors in second. DC Trident were another 108.5 points behind and Aqua Centurions finished last.

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MVP Sjostrom said: "There's still a little bit to learn about how the tactics should be but I feel like we are doing a really good job and we have a really good team around us."

MVP Sarah Sjostrom completes individual clean sweep at ISL

Energy Standard took a 21.5-point lead into the second day of competition thanks to their domination of the relays, worth double points, on the opening day.

Le Clos, a 10-time world short-course champion, and Sjostrom, the reigning 100m butterfly Olympic champion, were the team's heroes of the first day, the latter accounting for 22.5 points, more than any other individual swimmer.

Chad le Clos racks up another win

However, they came under early pressure from the Cali Condors thanks to a Lily King victory and then their first relay victory of the weekend, a one-two in the 100m IM relay that bagged them 32 points.

The deficit was slashed into single figures and when Melanie Margalis led another Condors 1-2 in the 4x200m IM, the Condors snuck into the lead.

However, the 50m butterfly saw Energy hit back immediately with Florent Manaudou and Le Clos locking out the top two positions and taking back the lead.

Le Clos enjoyed a brilliant meet

Image credit: Eurosport

Le Clos continued to dominate proceedings - even when he looked in trouble against Andreas Vazaios in the 100m butterfly, trailing by several metres with only a few strokes to go, he pulled an unlikely victory out of the bag.

That lead held strong until the skins eliminations races, where these matches will often be won and lost, with as many 48 points available in a race that consists of three consecutive 50m heats.

Sjostrom and Femke Heemskerk made sure it was maximum points for Energy Standard and that the win would be in the bag before the men even took to the water.

Even in the dead rubber though, Energy laid down a marker with another one-two as Manaudou and Britain's Ben Proud took maximum points.

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