World Champion Dong Zhihao Earns 200 Breast Gold At Chinese SC Nationals

2024 CHINESE SHORT COURSE NATIONALS

The 2024 Chinese Short Course Nationals continued on from Wuhan with reigning world champion Dong Zhihao making his presence known in the men’s 200m breaststroke.

Racing in the final of the event this evening, 19-year-old Dong put up a time of 2:04.83 to get to the wall first.

He was the sole competitor under the 2:05 barrier, with Yu Zongda next in line at 2:05.68 followed by Luan Honglin‘s outing of 2:06.84.

As for Dong, the teen’s performance checks in as a new lifetime best and now ranks him as China’s 4th-fastest SCM 200 breaststroker in history.

Top 5 Chinese Men’s SCM 200 Breaststroke Performers All-Time

  1. Qin Haiyang – 2:01.15, 2018
  2. Mao Feilian – 2:04.43, 2014
  3. Dong Zhihao – 2:04.83, 2024
  4. Yan Zibei – 2:04.52, 2017
  5. Wang Lizhuo – 2:05.39, 2018

The women’s edition of the 200m breast saw Zhu Leijie get it done for gold, producing a swift 2:20.36.

That eked out the victory by just .10 ahead of Liu Mengyang who settled for silver in 2:20.46. Lv Qinyao rounded out the podium in 2:21.30.

Zhu’s effort represents a new career-best mark and she ranks 7th among Chinese swimmers all time.

Wang Xueer was too quick to catch in the women’s 50m back, hitting 26.55. Behind her was Lu Xingchen in 26.65 and Zheng Huiyu earned bronze in 26.74.

It took a time of 25.25, the current world record, for newly-announced retiree Maggie MacNeil to win this event at the 2022 Short Course World Championships.

Wang Gukailai successfully doubled up on his 100m back win with another gold in the 50m back.

He shaved .17 off his semi-final swim of 23.59 from last night to register 23.42 as the victor.

Xu Yifan secured silver in 23.65 but there were two swimmers who tied for bronze. Jiang Chenglin and Lin Tao simultaneously touched in 23.71 to share that level of the podium.

The team of Zhejiang came out on top of the mixed 4x50m freestyle relay field. He Junyi (21.62), Shen Jiahao (21.25), Zhu Menghui (24.01) and Lv Yue (24.22) combined to clock a collective outing of 1:31.10 for group gold.

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cheese
1 month ago

The 200 Breast list is out of order. Dong and Yan should be swapped.

About Retta Race

Former Masters swimmer and coach Loretta (Retta) thrives on a non-stop but productive schedule. Nowadays, that includes having earned her MBA while working full-time in IT while owning French 75 Boutique while also providing swimming insight for BBC.

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