2024 RUSSIAN SWIMMING CHAMPIONSHIPS
- April 14-19, 2024
- Kazan, Russia
- LCM (50 meters)
- Meet Central
- Live Results
- Livestream
- Day 1 Recap
- Day 2 Recap
The 2024 Russian Swimming Championships continued in Kazan on Tuesday, and the third day of racing was action-packed. Finals of the men’s 100 butterfly, women’s 100 freestyle, women’s 200 backstroke, and men’s 800 freestyle were on the schedule of events along with semifinals of the women’s 50 butterfly, men’s 50 freestyle, women’s 100 breaststroke, and men’s 50 backstroke.
After clocking his fastest 100 fly effort since the Tokyo Olympics yesterday, Andrei Minakov lowered the mark to 50.86 for gold in the final. It checks-in as the 22-year-old’s 2nd fastest time ever, just sitting behind his national record from the 2019 Gwangju World Championships. He also moves up to 5th in the world so far this season, only sitting behind Noe Ponti (50.16), Matthew Temple (50.25), Caeleb Dressel (50.84), and Hubert Kos (50.84).
Andrei Minakov, Top 5 Fastest 100 Butterfly Performances:
- 50.83 — July 2019, Gwangju World Championships
- 50.86 — April 2024, Russian Championships
- 50.88 — July 2021, Tokyo Olympic Games
- 50.94 — July 2019, Gwangju World Championships
- 51.00 — July 2021, Tokyo Olympic Games
He split the race much more conservatively in tonight’s final: 23.91 at the 50m mark compared to 23.33 in semifinals. When he broke the national record in 2019, he found a middle ground between the two swims, as he split 23.50 on the first 50 and came home in 27.33 over the final 50 meters. He closed in 26.95 in tonight’s final and notched 27.71 during Monday’s semifinal swim. See a full splits comparison between the three races below.
Splits Comparison:
| Andrei Minakov In Finals: | Andrei Minakov In Semifinals: | Andrei Minakov‘s National Record From 2019: | |
| First 50 | 23.91 | 23.33 | 23.50 |
| Second 50 | 26.95 | 27.71 | 27.33 |
| Total Time | 50.86 | 51.04 | 50.83 |
The women’s 100 free final saw 2005-born Daria Klepikova snag gold in 54.09, just 0.02 outside her career-best 54.07 from July’s Russian Swimming Cup. Daria Trofimova, who swam to the fastest semifinal time of 54.06, touched in 54.42 for 3rd place. Her semifinal time would’ve been good enough for gold if she had replicated it. Trofimova has been as fast as 54.02 in the event, which she threw down last July. Yana Shakirova (54.36) held her 2nd place seed in the final. The top three finishers are all 19-years-old, which bodes well for the future of Russian sprinting.
The sprint breaststroke battle from the past few days was once again on display in the women’s 100m semifinals. After Tatiana Belonogoff outshined the field in yesterday’s 50m final, Evgeniia Chikunova made her intentions clear tonight. Chikunova (1:06.14) posted the only sub-1:07 time to lead the field into Wednesday’s final by well over a second. At this meet last year, Chikunova stunned with a big-time clocking of 1:04.92, which made her the 7th fastest performer in history.
Five competitors broke 25-seconds in the men’s 50 back semifinals, with world record holder Kliment Kolesnikov leading the way with a statement-making 24.28. Last July, Kolesnikov reclaimed his world record the Russian Swimming Clup with a blistering time of 23.55.
In yesterday’s 100 back, Kolesnikov had his 100 backstroke World Junior Record broken by Miron Lifintsev (52.34). Kolesnikov (52.80) had to settle for 2nd in that race behind Lifinstsev, but he looks to be the clear favorite for gold in tomorrow’s 50m final. Lifinstsev checked-in at 24.66 for the 3rd seed tonight, just off his best time of 24.56 from July.
Pavel Samusenko (24.35), Evgeny Rylov (24.70), and Dmitry Savenko (24.78) were the other athletes to swim in the 24-second realm. Rylov, who won double backstroke gold at the Tokyo Olympics, was 5th in yesterday’s 100m back final in 53.13. Savenko secured bronze in that same race with a sub-53 time (52.90).
Egor Kornev broke 22-seconds for the first time to lead the 50 free semifinals. He touched in 21.96 to slide under his previous lifetime best (22.01) from last July. On day one, Kornev led St. Petersburg to the 4×100 free relay gold medal with a best time leading-off his squad. He opened in 47.87 to dip under his previous best of 48.03 from last July. Tonight, Kornev led off the mixed 4×100 free relay in 48.23 to help his team to another relay gold (3:25.79).
Daniil Markov (22.05) sits in 2nd while Kolesnikov (22.10) lurks in 3rd overall. Kolesnikov (21.69) and Markov (21.85) both own sub-22 best times to their name from April of 2022.
Other Results:
- 15-year-old Milana Stepanova proved to be too fast for the rest of the women’s 200 back field. She put her hand on the wall in 2:11.37 for gold, with training partner Renata Gainullina (2:11.72) representing the only other swimmer under the 2:12-barrier.
- Kirill Martynychev, 21, touched 1st in the men’s 800 free final. His outing of 7:51.89 was enough to defeat the field by nearly two seconds. In a very tight battle for 2nd, it was Ivan Morgun (7:53.77) who got the touch ahead of Savely Luzin (7:53.82) and Monday’s 400m free winner Alexander Stepanov (7:54.18).
- 25-year-old Arina Surkova (25.77) was the only swimmer to crack 26-seconds in the women’s 50 fly semifinals. She owns the Russian record, courtesy of her 25.30 from this same meet last year.
The bias against Russians and Chinese swimmers is so funny lol. They don’t say anything when they swim slow, but when they put up competitive times they start throwing accusations
Well, in all fairness, drugs do make someone go faster so uh… faster times would be more suspect. Not saying the accusations are warranted nor correct, but your latter point used to substantiate the former is kind of moot. When people swim faster is naturally when accusations would happen.
Russians are actually swimming slow
What bias? It’s a maffia state with maffia practices, including in sports. Open your eyes
We still talking about Russia?
If McIntosh, Douglass, Jacoby, Armstrong or Finke were Russian or Chinese they would be hated on here as probably not clean
Not really. Everyone I see has respect and admiration for Zhang Yufei especially. I don’t see any accusations either for Pan or Qin. They’re just really good.
There definitely have been accusations against Pan and Qin
Yet. Sun Yangs accusations happened 4 yrs after he broke through.
Ridiculous statement. You can’t throw away the situational influence. We’ve seen and heard all of those swimmers throughout their careers. Every aspect has been available, from their training and college choices, to short course emphasis or lack thereof, to evolution of their program, etc. All of that lends to awareness and trust.
Those variables attach to very few swimmers or athletes from Russia and China. It’s laughable to believe that the skepticism is misplaced. Russian sports is crooked at core. The former biathlon president Anders Besseberg was sentenced just last week to more than three years in prison for receiving watches, prostitutes and hunting trips, as well as a car deal. One guess where the bribes came from. And… Read more »
This post did not age very well, ouch.
Daddy Caleb is coming for you Andrei
Can we please stop reporting news from Russia? I don’t think their times have any credibility.
Cry
Downvoters – I’m curious…why do you think times done at Russian swim meets have credibility?
And why do you think times done at Russian swim meets lack credibility? In case you’ve forgotten, the world record Kliment Kolesnikov set in the men’s 50 backstroke and the world record Evgenia Chikunova set in the women’s 200 breast stroke, occurred in Russia. Both world records were approved by Fina/World Aquatics. Before a record is approved, the swimmers must pass drug tests. So if the records were legitimate in the eyes of World Aquatics, why are they suspect in your eyes? Is it because you watched Icarus?
And I am suspicious of those two swims in particular, above all others. For the record, I think Minakov’s times are legitimate, due to his training location for most of the year.
Russia’s history with doping, their government’s involvement with this, the government’s general unwillingness/”dgaf” attitude about how most other countries in the world perceive them, and the trend that the records tend to occur occur in Russia and not elsewhere are a few reasons to be suspect, yes. The fina/world aquatics ratification means very little if the meet is currently located in Russia.
If you’re a “betting man”, there’s no way you can be confident in betting that those two records are both legitimate.
At the Tokyo Olympics, where the drugs tests were not in the hands of Russians, as they were at the Sochi Olympics on 2014, how many Russian swimmers tested positive? The answer is zero. When was the last world champion Russian swimmer to test positive? It was Yuliya Efimova, who was training in Southern California, walked into a GNC, bought a supplement over the counter, the tested positive within days. That was in 2013. It is now 2024. Since 2013, how many Russian world champions have tested positive? And, before you bring up 2016, and Efimova, she was cleared of any wrong doing, not by RUSADA, but by WADA.
World Aquatics is the governing body of the sport. In their… Read more »
No one is forcing you to click.
What’s Dressel’s best time without 8 TUEs?
damn who ain’t going 50.x these days???
Michael Andrew
lol
My second question mark thanks you.
Looks like Minakov is almost back to where he was pre-Dan-Schemmel!
Performances so far have not been excellent
Yes, but do we believe any times from Russians!
Will you believe it if he swam a 55.02?
What’s your point?
Imagine a swimmer who went 15:09 on Trials and a few months laters dropped 30 seconds to become Olympic Champion? would you believe?
Bobby Finke? He went 14:46 at Olympic Trials, the 15:09 was at Nationals or US Open the year before
Imagine if he also swam 14:48 at 2018 Pan Pacs and 14:51 at 2019 Nationals…
The dude trains in the US probably 48 weeks a year and swam at NCAAs just a fortnight ago. Unless you think Russian sports doping is so sophisticated it can conduct state sponsored doping on the Stanford campus, without US intelligence noticing, there’s no reason to be any more suspicious of Minakov than Rex Maurer.
Did bro train thru NCAAs? No way the times he went 2 weeks ago translate to 50.86
Sure seems like it
You mean, he rather wanted to be national champion than to win a local school meet?!
Maybe the dude hates his Stanford teammates? Maybe he didn’t swim fast on purpose? Seems a bit suspicious.