Arina Surkova Nails 100 Fly Season-Best At Russian Solidarity Games

2022 RUSSIAN SOLIDARITY GAMES

• Thursday, July 21st – Monday, July 25th
• Kazan, Russia
• LCM (50m)
• Day 1 Recap/Day 2 Recap
• Live Results
• Livestream

The 2022 Russian Solidarity Games continued in Kazan, with Mariia Kameneva, Anna Surkova and Kirill Prigoda highlighting the night’s events.

The swimming here is part of a multi-sport event being hosted by Russia after most of their sporting federations were barred from international competition following the country’s invasion of Ukraine in February. The ensuing war has resulted in at least 5,110 civilian deaths according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, and has displaced millions of people.

Russia’s banishment from many international sporting events include the recent FINA World Championships, which came after swimmer Evgeny Rylov appeared at a pro-war propaganda event.

The swimming competition features primarily athletes from Russia and Belarus, which was also banned from the World Championships for its part in the invasion,  though a handful of other countries have also sent athletes (including Syria, Kazakhstan, Vietnam, Armenia, South Africa, Tajikistan, and Sudan).

24-year-old Surkova came away with the women’s 100m fly victory, leading a trio of sub-58 second swimmers.

Surkova clocked a time of 57.58 to narrowly beat out Svetlana Chimrova who snagged silver in 57.64 while Anastasiya Kuliashova of Belarus was next in 57.80. Surkova opened the fastest in 26.13, although Chimrova stepped it up a gear on the back half to close in 30.96 to Surkova’s 31.45 to keep it close.

Surkova’s time here overtakes her previous season-best of 57.69, a time she put up this past April. Chimrova, too, earned a new season-best, getting under her previous mark of 58.06 from the same Russian Championships a few months ago.

As for Kameneva, the 23-year-old topped the women’s 50m backstroke field in a time of 27.65. That represents the only time under the 28-second threshold as Belarus’ Anastasiya Shkurdai touched about half a second later in 28.14.

Prigoda took on the men’s 50m breaststroke this evening, although the 26-year-old wound up with the bronze in the one-lap race.

Winning the 50m was Andrei Nikolaev who scored a mark of 26.86 while Belarusian ace Ilya Shymanovich took silver in 27.04. Prigoda wound up tying Danil Semyaninov for 3rd place in 27.20.

Sans two-time gold medalist here Kliment Kolesnikov in the field, the men’s 200m backstroke saw Nikolay Zaev grab the gold. Zaev checked in with a winning effort of 1:57.44.

Of note, two-time Olympic gold medalist Evgeny Rylov was among teh competitors, but the 25-year-old came in 4th in a time of 1:58.20. He had been faster in the prelims with a morning result of 1:57.69 as the top-seeded swimmer.

Additional Winners

• Margarita Ershova topped the women’s 1500m free field in a time of 16:17.11, taking the top spot by over 14 seconds.
• The men’s 800m free relay saw the squad from Moscow pull out the win, with the foursome of Vladislav Grinev (1:47.92), Mikhail Dovgalyuk (1:47.84), Daniil Shatalov (1:47.19) and Aleksandr Egorov (1:50.99) collectively clocking a winning time of 7:13.94.
• St. Petersburg took the women’s 400m medley relay title, with the team of Vlada Eggi (1:02.97), Chimrova (57.56), Evgeniia Chikunova (1:06.62) and Daria S. Ustinova (54.03) getting to the wall first in 4:01.18 this evening.