A star-studded TYR Pro Swim Series at San Antonio kicked off Wednesday night with the 1500-meter freestyle. In her first national-level, long-course race since March of 2020, distance powerhouse Katie Ledecky topped the women’s field with a 15:42.92 performance, while Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 open-water qualifier Jordan Wilimovsky took the men’s event in 15:15.28, good for the second-fastest swim by an American in 2021.

Ledecky’s time bested a field made up entirely of U.S. National Team and National Junior Team athletes. Her swim set a new top time in the world in 2021 by over 17 seconds and was good for the 13^th-fastest swim of her decorated career.

“It’s good to see everyone and race other people and get off to a good start here,” Ledecky said after her swim against a decorated field. “It’s great. It’s always good when the top swimmers are together and race each other, so it’s fun.”

For Wilimovsky, the win gave him the second TYR Pro Swim Series win of his career. His time shaved 15 seconds from his previous performance in the mile, which came at the 2020 Toyota U.S. Open last November.

“It was fun,” Wilimovsky said. “I was just doing training camp with three of the six guys that swam tonight so we were joking before, we did a 1500 fast last week and the one before that, so it was just like another day at practice. It was fun to get some racing in.”

Turning in top-3 finishes in the evening’s distance event were U.S. National Teamers Ashley Twichell and Erica Sullivan, who finished in 16:04.29 and 16:07.66, respectively. On the men’s side, U.S. National Junior Team member Will Gallant came through with a second-place finish in 15:20.39.

The 2021 TYR Pro Swim Series at San Antonio continues Thursday through Saturday at the Bill Walker Pool & Josh Davis Natatorium in San Antonio Texas.