Chinese swimmer Xinyi Chen broke a Jr world record in the 100m fly at the 2014 Asian Games, absolutely smashing her own previous Jr world record of 57.54 that she set at the Chinese trials in May with a time of 56.61.
Chen, 16, would have been ranked third overall for the 2013-2014 season with that time just behind Swedish star Sarah Sjostrom and Denmark’s Jeanette Ottesen Gray.
During the 100m fly final, Chen was out quick splitting a 26.81 heading into that first wall. She turned first, but eventual second and third place finishers Ying Lu and Li Tao weren’t far behind.
On that last 50, Chen found another gear and split a 29.80 on the final 50 to touch the wall in first and become the 2014 Asian Games 100m fly champion. Nobody else in the field was even under 31 second coming home, showing how impressive Chen’s back-half speed was.
She’ll have some room left if she wants to target the Chinese national record which stands at 56.09 set by Liu Zige back in 2009. Most notably she’ll have to control her front end speed and be out a little quicker if she wants to start inching towards times like Zige’s.
The world record split for example had Dana Vollmer of the United States going out in a 26.39 and back in a 29.59. If Chen can manage to improve that first 50 to a 26-mid or 26-low there’s no doubt that she’ll be able to come in contact with those target times.
For now however, she’s established herself as the flyer for the Chinese team. Considering how young she is the experience puts her in a great spot heading into Rio. There, she’ll be just 18-years-old where she’ll most likely have more than Jr world records on her mind.
Not to take anything away from how incredible this swim is but, it seems like there are so many young Asian swimmers (China and Japan are the countries I am thinking about specifically) that put up amazing times at a young age and then taper off or never make headlines again. There are obviously exceptions to this rule (Ye Shiwen, Hagino, etc.) but I was wondering if anybody has any insight as to why peaking at such a young age seems to be more common in these countries, at least at the international level
There are equally many chinese/japanese swimmers who still produced fast times when they got older, such as:
Aya Terakawa, Liu Zige, Jiao Liuyang, Tang Yi, Fu Yuanhui, Zhao Jing, Satomi Suzuki, Lu Ying, Rie Kaneto, Natsumi Hoshi, etc.
On the other hand, there are also many Australian/US female swimmers who were so good during their junior days and yet stopped accomplishing internationally when they got older, such as:
Yolane Kukla, Mikaela Sheridan, Rebecca Brown, Felicia Lee, Lia Neal, Dagny Knutson, etc.
My guess would be that Asians tend to hit growth peaks sooner (as do girls). From my memory in college, not many grew much in ways that would be beneficial to swimming, while I know many swimmers of other races that packed on inches or pounds of muscle.