Russian Short Course Championships: Records broken every day

The most medals were taken by the Volgograd Oblast (9 gold, 4 silver, 4 bronze). St. Petersburg eventually managed to overrun Moscow in a medal chase: 32 medals (7 gold, 17 silver, 8 bronze) against 23 medals (7 gold, 7 silver, 9 bronze).

The best result was achieved by Nikita Konovalov (Omsk) who represented the Volgograd Oblast at the tournament: he grabbed 5 gold and 1 silver medals. He is followed by Daria Ustinova (5 gold and 1 bronze medals) and Veronika Popova (4 gold and 3 silver medals). Konovalov admitted in one of his interviews that he already started falling sick during the competitions but he doesn’t feel worn out.

“The funny thing is that everything is just the other way round: it’s not like I want to prolong the duration of the competition but, let us say, I can have a day off and than gladly go to some other tournament. If we had had another national championship, I would have loved to participate in it again."

“The result is very good despite the fact that I have not been preparing for this competition at all. I will go to the Europeans; we will start gearing up for it soon but we will decrease the amount of training load. I knew that everyone will swim as fast as they did yesterday and I raced at my own pace without regard to other swimmers’ speed,” Daria Ustinova commented after taking the title in the 100m backstroke. 

The best results based on the FINA point table were shown by Oleg Kostin of the Nizhny Novgorod Oblast in the 200m breaststroke (950 points), and Veronika Popova in the 200m freestyle (955 points).

“I’m happy with the result; basically it’s much the same as my last year’s result. But I came to Kazan after competing in three legs of the FINA World Cup. I thought that I will have a hard time but I did well. As for the World Cup, I got acclimated quite well there, overcame jet lag, mustered up all my strength and showed the best I am capable of. Of course, I plan to compete at the European championships. I will fight for medals!” said Oleg Kostin.

The tournament was brightened up by a number of national junior records set by such young aspiring athletes as Anastasia Kirpichnikova (8:20.17 in the 800m freestyle), Nikita Bodrov (24.11 in the 50m backstroke) and Roman Larin (1:53.06 in the 200m backstroke).

Nikolay Snegirev beat a national junior record with 3:45.98 in the 400m freestyle heat and later improved his own record in the final (3:44.51). Daniil Pakhomov broke records in the 100m individual medley semifinal (54.26) and in the 200m butterfly final (1:53.10). Arina Openysheva also owns two records: in the 400m freestyle (4:03.08) and in the 200m freestyle (1:56.12).

The world junior records were beaten by Elizaveta Permyakova in the 50m butterfly (she improved her own semifinal records – 26.05) and by Anton Chupkov in the 100m breaststroke (57.61). Chupkov also set a national junior record in the 200m breaststroke (2:03.57). As for experienced swimmers, national records were broken by Svetlana Chimrova in the 100m butterfly (56.87) and by Viktoria Andreeva in the 100m individual medley (59.70).

“My coach told me: ‘You are ready for 56.8. Go and nail it!’ So I went and nailed it. I was ready for it both mentally and physically,” commented Svetlana Chimrova after the heat.  

“Actually, I haven’t planned to beat a record in the 100m event because I have a hard time swimming it. But I was on cloud nine when I did it. We want to dedicate it to my first coach, Boris Nazarov, and Mikhail Amelchenko who had also trained me. Unfortunately, they both passed away,” Andreeva said after winning the race.

Interim head coach of the Russian national swimming team, Sergey Kolmogorov, informed that instead of the 30-35 athletes planned earlier 38 athletes qualified for the European championships. Because of her intensive training programme, Svetlana Chimrova will not take part in the Europeans. The European Short Course Swimming Championships are due to be held in Netanya (Israel) on December 2-6, 2015. 

Press Office of Executive Directorate for Sports Projects