The Hamilton export had to pack up and leave Melbourne with his training squad as the city prepared to enter a fourth coronavirus lockdown last month.

"When the border closed we were at training early in the morning and our coach (Sebastian Bettiol) pulled us out mid-rep and told us it was not looking good and we might have to leave," he said.

"That was about 9.45-10 and then we (the Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre's high performance squad) sat around to make decision.

"Our options were to stay at home, go up north with the other high performance squads or go to Adelaide.

"The six of us plus our coach decided to come to Adelaide so we left around one o'clock which was a three-to-four hour turnaround to get out of training and leave. That was an interesting couple of hours.

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"We got across border half an hour before they closed on us and that was the 26^th (of May) so we made it just in time.

"We followed all health regulations and got tests, which were all negative, and started training at Adelaide Aquatic Centre while we waited for exceptions to be allowed in the competition pool in Marion."

Christie-Crane, 20, said MSAC's high performance squad started its stay in Adelaide in Kent Town before moving closer to the pool when the trials began on Saturday.

The RMIT physics degree student said when he was not training he spent time with the team and continued his university studies.

Christie-Crane, who is a member of Warrnambool Swimming Club, said he felt lucky to be in Adelaide to attend the trials for the Tokyo Olympics.

"It was the easy decision because we could make it but it was a bit of a roll of the dice and we lucked out on that," he said.

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"We are very happy but we also feel for all the ones that were stuck back home and couldn't get across and can't now, which is unfortunate for them.

"It has been good and felt like a simulated training camp that you do for stuff like the Olympics and it's been a good training environment."

Christie-Crane is swimming in the 100-metre freestyle heats on Tuesday and is up against hometown hero and Rio gold medallist Kyle Chalmers, who is aiming to book his ticket to a second Olympics.

The Melbourne resident said he would normally not arrive in Adelaide until just before the event but felt he was settled and ready to go because of his long stay in South Australia.

"Being here already and settling in you know your way around and traffic doesn't surprise you and you get a good idea of the warm-up pool and a good look at the comp pool," he said.

Christie Crane, who qualified with a time of 52.07 seconds, will hit the pool in the 10am session on Tuesday as some of Australia's fastest freestyle swimmers battle for spots in the final later that night.

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