2026 ROMANIAN NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Wednesday, April 22nd – Sunday, Apri 26th
- Otopeni, Romania
- LCM (50m)
- Live Results
The 2026 Romanian National Championships got underway from Otopeni today, with the competition spanning a potentially exciting five days.
21-year-old Olympic champion David Popovici is among the top-tier of athletes racing this week, with the phenom taking on the men’s 50m freestyle to kick off his campaign.
After posting a solid morning swim of 22.11 to capture the top seed out of the heats, Popovici sliced off another .09 to check in with a gold medal-worthy effort of 22.02 this evening.
That got him to the wall in a comfortable advantage over Patrick Dinu, relegated to silver in 22.33, and Mihai Gergely, who rounded out the podium in 22.69.
As for Popovici, the ace’s 22.02 outing here ties his 3rd-best ever performance, with his resume boasting a lifetime best of 21.83 from taking the title at last year’s edition of these championships. He now ranks just outside the list of top 25 performers worldwide on the season.
David Popovici‘s Top 5 LCM 50 Freestyle Performances
- 21.83 – April 2025
- 21.86 – June 2025
- 22.02 – June 2025 & April 2026
- –
- 22.14 April 2025
In other men’s races, we reported how 18-year-old Robert Badea put up an explosive new lifetime best of 1:58.86 in the 200m IM to establish the first sub-1:59 result of his career. You can read more about his Romanian record-setting outing here.
On the women’s side of the house, Theodora Dimitru logged a time of 25.63 to lead a trio of athletes under the 26-second barrier in the 50m freestyle.
The 16-year-old held off Irina Preda, who settled for silver in 25.77, followed by Andreea Comna who touched in 25.84 for bronze.
Daira Silisteanu earned a new Romanian national record en route to winning the women’s 100m back.
She posted 59.63, her first time ever under the minute mark, crushing her former lifetime best of 1:00.02 from the 2025 Romanian National Championships, which stood as the former national record.
Silisteanu opened in 29.45 and closed in 30.18 to erase the former Romanian benchmark and grab the gold tonight.
Behind her was Aissia Preisecariu who nailed 1:00.92 as runner-up, with Ana Rozorea bagging the bronze in 1:03.09.
21.8/46.5/1:42.9 HAS to be the best 50/100/200 free add up in history
Popovici 1:45.89 in the 200 free
Last year he was 1:45.0 and 47.3 in 100 free
David needs desperately to join an NCAA Team.
Then he might become truly great.
Imagine Popovici at a David Marsh back to the future led AU!
You are such a troll.
He DESPERATELY needs to join Dean at SPW. Both 100 and 200 WRs would be a lock if he did.
holy moly he is only 21?!?!?
I know! He’s such a fixture, like he has been around for a decade!
Patrick Dinu. Not Dina.
Cam
Should go 21.3/25.0 and see if he can give skinny legend a push!
More like 21.1/31.1
More like 21.1/DNF