Kayla Sanchez Breaks Filipino National Records At 2022 Czech Cup

2022 CZECH CUP – PILSEN SPRINTS

• Thursday, October 13th – Saturday, October 14th
• Pilsen, Czech Republic
• SCM (25m)
• SwimSwam Preview
• Results
• Livestream

The 2022 Czech Cup in Pilsen concluded over the weekend with the likes of Estonian swimmer Kregor Zirk, Hungarian ace Szebasztian Szabo, and Canadian-turned-Filipino athlete Kayla Sanchez among the competitors. The visitors battled against host country swimmers like Barbora Seemanova, Simona Kubova, and more through the 3-day affair which took place in the short course meters format.

Sanchez had been a member of Team Canada’s national team since 2017 but in July of this year announced that she intends to change her sporting citizenship to the Philippines. Sanchez currently trains alongside Seemanova under the direction of Luka Gabrilo. FINA still lists Sanchez’s national affiliation as Canada, as she must spend a year in residence before she is able to represent the Philippines officially.

While competing in Pilsen, Sanchez put up solid times in both the women’s 50m and 100m freestyle events. In the former, she stopped the clock at 24.63 while in the latter she grabbed gold in a time of 52.71.

Both of these times are faster than the current Filipino national records, though she’s not yet eligible to break those records.

Entering the meet, the national standard in the 50m free stood at the 25.51 Jasmine Al-Khaldi logged in 2019. Al-Khaldi also owned the 100m free Filipino record with the 55.38 she produced at the 2018 World Championships.

Sanchez is the current World Junior Record holder in the 100m free set at 51.45 in 2018. She is also the WJR holder in the 50m free, putting up a mark of 23.94 in that same year.

Although she settled for silver in the 50m back, Sanchez also surpassed the current Filipino record in that event. Sanchez registered a time of 26.86 to get to the wall just .03 behind winner Kubova, who swam 26.83.

Sanchez’s silver medal effort at this meet is faster than the 27.62 Chloe Isleta posted as the Filipino national standard at the 2021 FINA Short Course World Championships.

For his part, Szabo topped the men’s 100m free podium in a time of 48.20. He also proved too quick to catch in the 50m fly, earning gold in 22.87. Szabo is the current World Record holder in the men’s 50m fly in a tie with Brazilian Nicholas Santos via a 21.75 from the 2021 European Championships.

Estonia’s Zirk clocked a time of 1:52.90 to reign over the men’s 20m fly event, while the Czech Republic’s Kubova took control of the women’s 100m fly in 1:00.07.

Additional Winners

• Seemanova was the women’s 50m fly winner, earning a time of 26.23. That fell within striking distance of the longstanding Czech national record of 26.09 Lucie Svecena put on the books in 2016. She also won the best performance of the meet with 1.53.7 in the 200 free
• Hungary’s Zsuzsanna Jakabos posted a winning effort of 2:09.46 in the 200m fly while also reaping gold in the 400m IM in a result of 4:42.39.
• 34-year-old David Verraszto of Hungary produced a time of 4:07.78 to handily take the men’s 400m IM event.
• Austrian ace Christopher Rothbauer got it done for gold in both the 100m and 200m breast events. The 24-year-old logged a time of 58.66 in the former and 2:06.09 in the latter to collect his hardware.
• The men’s 100m back saw Romanian Olympian Robert Glinta post 50.54 for gold, beating Tomas Franta of the host country by just .13. Franta owns the Czech national record with the 50.59 he swam at last year’s Short Course World Championships, meaning his 50.67 here fell within .08 of that result.