Kazan to host Russian Short Course Swimming Championships

The competitions will include around 500 athletes representing more than 60 regions of the Russian Federation. Among them are top athletes of the Russian national team: Olympic medallists Sergey and Anastasia Fesikovas, Evgeny Lagunov, Mikhail Polischuk, world and European champions and medallists Stanislav Donets, Evgeny Sedov, Oleg Tikhobaev, Nikita Konovalovk Nikolay Skvortsov, Kirill Prigoda, Vyacheslav Sinkevich, Veronika Popova, Darya K. Ustinova, Rozalia Nasretdinova.

The national championships will see a tough struggle unfold among aspiring athletes who triumphed at the 1st European Games and 2015 FINA World Junior Swimming Championships: Maria Astashkina, Maria Kameneva, Arina Openysheva, Anton Chupkov, Daniil Pakhomov and others. All of them are have strong chances of earning medals at the national championships and at the upcoming European Short Course Swimming Championships that are due to be held in Netanya (ISR) on December 2-6, 2015.

The official opening ceremony of the Russian Short Course Swimming Championships that will take place before Day 1’s evening session will see the attendance of Tatarstan’s leadership and President of the Russian Swimming Federation, FINA and LEN bureaus member and four-time Olympic champion Vladimir Salnikov.

46 medal events will be contested within 5 days. The competitions will determine the best athletes with the highest scoring swim based on the FINA point tables. The swimming events will be supervised by 50 technical officials, 23 of them are from the Republic of Tatarstan.   

Apart from enjoying the live action from the event, fans and spectators are in for a lot of surprises. As part of the Event Services programme, the Russian Swimming Federation and Swimming Federation of the Republic of Tatarstan will provide orphaned children and students of the Volga Federal District Children’s University with free invitations to the competitions and organise for them an autograph session with members of the Russian national swimming team. The event will take place on November 11, 2015 right before the start of the evening session.

During the competitions, there will be workshops organised for coaches, technical officials and team representatives. The workshops will be hosted by Merited Coach of the USSR and Russia, Viktor Avdienko; interim head coach of the Russian national team and Doctor of Biological Sciences, Yury Zherdev (for more information, please go to the Russian Swimming Federation’s official website).

The event is powered by the Ministry of Sport of the Russian Federation, Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sport of the Russian Federation, Executive Directorate for Sports Projects, Russian Swimming Federation and Swimming Federation of the Republic of Tatarstan. The Universiade Village serves as the official place of accommodation for the event’s participants.

The competitions are held with the support of the Russian Swimming Federation’s general partner, PAO Gazprom; the Russian Swimming Federation’s general partner, AO Siberian Coal Energy Company; the Russian national team’s general partner, OAO United Chemical Company URALCHEM; the Russian Swimming Federation’s sponsors, FSUE Russian Post, State Corporation Bank of Development and Foreign Economic Affairs  (Vnesheconombank), OAO Aerospace Equipment Corporation, Compulink Group, and the event’s sponsor, Arena.

The official opening ceremony of the Russian Short Course Championships will take place at the Aquatics Palace, Kazan on November 8 at 17.45.

The preliminary heats kick off at 10.00 while the finals and semifinals begin at 18.00.

Source: Press Office of All-Russian Swimming Federation