Brazil’s Nelson Da Silva Junior Cracks Two Meet Records In Aachen

48TH ANNUAL SWIM FESTIVAL, AACHEN

• Friday, October 13th – Sunday, October 15th
• Schwimmhalle Ost, Aachen, Germany
• 25m
• Results

The 48th Annual International Swim Festival took place in Aachen, Germany over the weekend, with 8,650 € ($10,200 USD) in prize money up for grabs.

The meet was unique in that it offers both a ‘Specialist Reward’, as well as a ‘Sprint Reward’, based on performances across linked events of the same stroke or distance. For instance, the Specialist Reward designated prize money for both men and women establishing the highest FINA point score across both the 100m and 200m butterfly, 100m and 200m backstroke, 100m and 200m breaststroke and 100m and 200m freestyle events.

The ‘long distance specialist’ was designated as the male and female swimmers who scored the highest FINA point total across the 400m and 800m/1500m freestyle events, while the ‘medley specialist’ ranked highest FINA points-wise in the 200m and 400m IM races. In each of the aforementioned categories, the three best swimmers (male and female) get a prize money of 100 €, 50 € and 30 € respectively.

As for the ‘sprint reward’, points were divvied among the 8 fastest swimmers in the prelims of all 50m competitions, as well as the 100m IM. Points were given as 10 for 1st, 8 for 2nd, 6 for 3rd, 5 for 4th, 4 for 5th, 3 for 6th, 2 for 7th and 1 for 8th, with the three best swimmers with the highest score from all 5 competitions will be awarded a prize money of 250 €, 150 € and 100 € respectively.

Among the winners within each aforementioned category was Brazilian Nelson da Silva Junior, who racked up 2 meet records over the course of the competition. Nelson first fired off a 50m backstroke prelim time of 24.23, then produced a speedy 52.45 time in the 100m backstroke prelim.

Although Silva would wind up being disqualified in the 50m backstroke final for a past-15m underwater violation, he went on to win the 100m backstroke by over 3 seconds in a solid mark of 52.50.

Below are the winners in each category:

Long Distance: Marieke Tienstra (NED) & Poul Zellmann (GER)

Sprint: Kim Busch (NED) & Nyls Korstanje (NED)

Breaststroke: Jessica Steiger (GER) & Arjan Knipping (NED)

Butterfly: Kinge Zandringa (NED) & Matthys Goosen (NED)

Backstroke: Tessa Vermeulen (NED) & Nelson da Silva Junior (BRA)

Medley: Emelie Schnagl (NED) & Arjan Knipping (NED)

Freestyle: Marjolein Delno (NED) & Ben Schwietert (NED)