Look Out, Tokyo, California's Coming

First the Japanese were the world's top swimmers; then it was the Australians. Now the U.S. rules the pools. In the 1960 Rome Olympics, American men and women splashed off with nine of 15 gold medals. The competition will be tougher in Tokyo this October, but then so will the U.S. In a pre-Olympic test, 380 youngsters turned up last week in Los Altos Hills, Calif., for the national A.A.U. championships. Nine world records and 20 American marks disappeared beneath the bubbles.

The lone outlander among the record breakers was Australia's Murray Rose, a durable veteran of 25, who took time off from his Hollywood acting career to regain the 1,500-meter freestyle record he first held eight years ago. But just about everything else was California's. Or, rather, Santa Clara's. The Santa Clara Swim Club, alma mater of Olympic Queens Chris von Saltza and Lynn Burke, swam away with four of the world records, won 14 of 30 events, and became the first club ever to win both the men's and women's championships.

"My Property." Of course they were this year's host club. But that could hardly account for the performance put on by Don Schollander, 18, a smooth-cheeked broth of a boy who favors gaudy red, white and blue swimsuits and starts like a torpedo out of a tube. In the 400-meter freestyle, he clipped nearly 1 sec. off the world record with a 4-min. 12.7-sec. clocking. Next he stepped up for the 200-meter freestyle --down went the record by nearly 1 sec., to 1 min. 57.6 sec. "I always think of the 200 as my property," said Schollander, then for encores added the 100-meter title and anchored both winning freestyle relays for Santa Clara.

It went on that way for the better part of four days. Schollander's Santa Clara Teammate Dick Roth, 16, knocked almost 2 sec. off the 400-meter individual medley (butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke, freestyle) in 4 min. 48.6 sec., picked up an American record in the 200-meter medley. Santa Clara's girls? Freckle-faced Claudia Kolb, 14, merely won two medals in the 100-meter and 200-meter breaststroke. Then there was Donna de Varona, already an Olympic veteran at 17, who won both individual medleys, besides helping all three winning relays for Santa Clara.

Whole Flotilla. On behind the Santa Clara swimmers came a whole flotilla of young water bugs. City of Commerce, Calif.'s Sharon Stouder, 15, matched Schollander's triple by winning the 100-meter freestyle and the 100-meter butterfly, then lowered the world 200-meter butterfly record by almost 3 sec. to 2 min. 26.4 sec. Arizona's Marilyn Ramenofsky, 17, thrashed through the 400-meter freestyle in 4 min. 41.7 sec., breaking Chris von Saltza's listed world record by 2.8 sec.

Next stop for the swimmers is the Olympic trials in Queens, N.Y., later this month. After last week's A.A.U. spectacular, some coaches might be expected to taper off for fear of overtraining. Not Santa Clara's George Haines. "We didn't even attempt to reach our peak," he said. "Our boys and girls will be better for the Olympic trials, and better still for the Olympic games." So back to work it was for his young charges, swatting up and down the pool, practicing twice a day.

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