2021 LATVIAN OPEN
- Friday, February 26th – Sunday, February 28th
- Riga, Latvia
- LCM (50m)
- Olympic Qualifying Competition
- Live Results
- Livestream
The Latvian Open wrapped up today from Riga but not before 14-year-old Eneli Jefimova of Estonia claimed another breaststroke medal.
After posting a monster lifetime best of 1:07.53 in the 100m breast on night 1, Jefimova fired off a mark of 31.06 to take the top prize in the 50m breast on this final night of action.
This morning, the top-seeded 50m breaststroker out of the women’s heats was represented by Belarus’ Alina Zmushka. The 24-year-old logged a morning swim of 30.88 to produce the only sub-31 second time of the entire field through both prelims and finals, with the time only .27 off her own lifetime best and national record of 30.61 from 2019.
Tonight, however, Jefimova got to the wall first in the medal contention race, posting 31.06 to Zmushka’s 31.25. Finnish swimmer Jenna Laukkanen rounded out the top 3 in 31.86. Jefimova’s time tonight checks-in as a new Estonian national record.
As for the men, leave it to Belarusian short course world record holder Ilya Shymanovich to complete the breaststroking sweep, capturing 50m breast gold in 27.18. Shymanovich’s result was well off his personal best of 26.55 from 2019 but it was enough to get the job done by a second here.
Additional winners included Mimosa Jallow of Finland earning the gold in the women’s 50m back in 28.16, while Mikita Tsmyh of Belarus claimed the win in the men’s edition in 25.57.
Yauhen Tsurkin of Belarus was the top 100m freestyler for the men in 50.03 while Sajan Prakash of India topped the men’s 200m fly podium in 1:59.31.
