The sports science major is from Maldonado, the fourth-largest city in the small South American country nestled on the South Atlantic Ocean between Brazil and Argentina. Uruguay had yet to win a medal at the 2024 Olympics through Thursday.

Nolles competed in the fourth heat of the men’s 100-meter freestyle, finishing in 50.58 seconds to place fourth in his heat that took place at 11:17 a.m. French time, or 5:17 a.m. EDT in the U.S.

Most of the top swimmers competed in the last five of the 10 heats held.

He finished just 0.23 of a second behind heat winner Nikolas Antoniou of Cyprus as the top 16 times among 79 entrants advanced to the semifinals, along with two reserve swimmers, though the NMU Sports Information news release about Nolles didn’t detail what “reserve” meant.

Leo Nolles NMU men's swimming team

Nolles’ time placed him 47th, 2.17 seconds out of the 16th qualifying spot taken by Sunwoo Hwang of Korea and 3.01 seconds behind top qualifier Jack Alexy of the United States.

During the Wildcats’ 2023-24 season, Nolles set a PEIF pool record in the 50-yard free against Wisconsin-Green Bay before earning First Team All-American honors in the 400 free relay, where Northern finished sixth at the NCAA Division II national meet in mid-March. He joined William LaCount, Jef Leroux and Gabriel Fulconi on that unit.

Nolles was also a Second Team All-American in five more events — the 50 free, 100 free, 200 medley relay, 200 free relay and 800 free relay — all also based on finishes at the D-II nationals.

At the GLIAC Championships in mid-February, he won the 50 free and was seventh in the 100 butterfly along with picking up a trio of podium finishes in NMU relays.

He was also a CSC all-district honors recipient, the Wildcats’ male MVP for the season and earned GLIAC Swimmer of the Week in the first week of the season.

Northern Michigan University's Leo Nolles, center, stands with a pair of Wildcats' men's swimming teammates at the GLIAC Championships held in downstate Holland in mid-February. (Photo courtesy NMU)

Full results from all heats of the Olympic men’s 100 free are available at https://olympics.com/en/paris-2024/results/swimming/men-s-100m-freestyle/heat——–?utm_medium=sidearm-email&utm_source=nmuwildcats.com&utm_campaign=Leo+Nolles+Completes+100+Meter+Freestyle+in+the+Paris+2024+Olympic+Games&utm_content=0e3930d5-df8b-4a08-bc8d-51e5e74fdaf9.

Nolles’ race is available online at by logging into Peacock TV and skipping ahead to the 21:05 time mark. The long website name is https://www.peacocktv.com/signin?return=%2Fwatch%2Fplayback%2Fevent%2FPCKSLE%3AReplay-5005752%2Fe05c95e6-03dc-3f82-8d56-acb2a36d9fb9%3FdestinationRailId%3Dd5ef12d8-dc96-11ee-a4ac-f7de1259a0c1%26destinationRailUrl%3Dhttps%25253A%25252F%25252Fbff-ext.clients.peacocktv.com%25252Fbff%25252Fbrowse%25252Fv1%25252Frails%25252Fd5ef12d8-dc96-11ee-a4ac-f7de1259a0c1%25253Fpage_id%25253D641074ba-4bcd-11ec-8cd9-abd6340d9c75%252526mode%25253DCONNECTED_NAV%26groupParent%3D524a5dd2-4dae-11ef-ac06-3b15ed3edd86%26paused%3Dtrue%26utm_medium%3Dsidearm-email%26utm_source%3Dnmuwildcats.com%26utm_campaign%3DLeo%2BNolles%2BCompletes%2B100%2BMeter%2BFreestyle%2Bin%2Bthe%2BParis%2B2024%2BOlympic%2BGames%26utm_content%3Dbb5bed15-aa35-4262-accd-b0a861f3a750.

Information compiled by Journal Sports Editor Steve Brownlee. His email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.