Breaststroke Battle Brewing, As JPN’s Shoma Sato Devises New Race Strategy

The international breaststroking field is deeper than we’ve seen in a long time, with the 200m distance, in particular, drawing Olympic-worthy times during domestic competitions.

Australian Zac Stubblety-Cook threw down a monster 2:07.28 at the Queensland Championships in December to become the world’s 7th fastest performer of all-time.

Already this year, now-19-year-old Japanese World Junior Championships silver medalist Shoma Sato bypassed the 2:08-target altogether, bringing his previous personal best of 2:09.21 down to a scorching 2:07.58 at January’s Kosuke Kitajima Cup. With him in the race was former World Record holder Ippei Watanabe, who also nailed a head-turning in-season effort of 2:07.86

22-year-old Watanabe has publicly said he is aiming for a time in the 2:05 range at Japan’s Olympic Trials, the Japan Swim, scheduled for the first week of April. Achieving that feat would not only ‘put pressure on his rivals’, as Watanabe indicated, but it would register a new World Record, diving under the 2:06.12 set by Russian Anton Chupkov en route to 2019 World Championships gold.

Watanabe isn’t the only man with time tunnel-vision, however, as Sato says he is aiming for a 2:06.

Aware that he is competing primarily against Watanabe (and the clock) come April, Sato said his plan is to ‘train myself to swim in the 1:04 range in the back half of the race without rushing the front half.’ (Tokushima Shimbun)

When Sato put up his PB of 2:07.58 last month, a time that ranks the teen #2 in the world this season, his splits were composed of 1:01.41/1:06.17. With his 1:04 back-half goal in mind, to hit a 2:06, as Sato said, he would need to go out fast enough to pace the field, but not zealously so where he would lose steam on the final stretch.

Sato is among those swimmers invited to this weekend’s Konami Open, the meet at which racers will be awarded a bonus of $275,000 for a new World Record and $50,000 for any new Japanese national record. The opportunity may give Sato the chance to try out a new race strategy before the Japan Swim with essentially nothing to lose and some sweet cash and confidence to gain.

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Adam
4 years ago

I think Tokyo 2020
200 Breaststroke
Gold 1. Watanabe Ippei 2.05.23
Silver 2. Chupkov Anton 2.05.42
Bronze 3. Kamminga Arno 2.06.20
4. Wilson Matthew 2.06.21
5. Banladin Dimitri 2.06.94
6. Stubblety-Cook Zac 2.06.98
7. Sato Shoma 2.07.10
8. Marco Koch 2.07.22
9. Matheny Joshua 2.07.43

IM FAN
Reply to  Adam
4 years ago

This is the Olympics, not a fan fic

nuotofan
4 years ago

Some notes: 1) Chupkov’s contenders aiming for a 1.04 range back-half, when Chupkov already was 1.03.90 at last Worlds (for his 1.06.12 WR) 2) The best distribution widely depends on every swimmer characteristics: for instance, Matthew Wilson is right, imo, to push in the front-half (1.00.6 in the final at Gwangju) and he has to dip in the 1.05 range in the back-half of the race, whilst Stubblety-Cook was 1.02.0-1.05.3 at Gwangju, but 1.01.7-1.05.5 at December, in a training period, so his strategy for the peak-time (Olympics) could be swim 1.01 low-1.04 high.

Aquajosh
4 years ago

I’m sure Koseki (PB 2:07.29) would love to hear that Watanabe and Sato don’t see him as competition.

YGJ
Reply to  Aquajosh
4 years ago

Yeah I hope he doesn’t get upset and beat anyone up

(G)olden Bear
4 years ago

Smart – that’s probably the only way to have a chance of beating Chupkov.

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Retta Race

Former Masters swimmer and coach Loretta (Retta) thrives on a non-stop but productive schedule. Nowadays, that includes having just earned her MBA while working full-time in IT while owning French 75 Boutique while also providing swimming insight for BBC.

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