The Japanese Swimming Federation has announced a team of 25 athletes who they will be sending to the World Championships in Kazan.
There will be nine men and four women that will be competing in individual events along with 12 other swimmers who will be taken for the purpose of relay events.
Those swimming individual events include:
Male – Kosuke Hagino, Ryosuke Irie, Masaki Kaneko, Takeshi Kawamoto, Yashuhiro Koseki, Ryo Tateishi, Takuro Fujii, Daiya Seto and Masato Sakai.
Female – Rie Kaneto, Kanako Watanabe, Natsumi Hoshi and Sakiko Shimizu.
Relay swimmers will include:
Male – Tsubasa Amai, Yuki Kobori, Katsumi Nakamura and Shinri Shioura.
Female – Sayaka Akase, Tomomi Aoki, Chihiro Igarashi, Rikako Ikee, Yayoi Matsumoto, Sachi Mochida, Miki Uchida and Misaki Yamaguchi.
At the 2013 World Championships in Barcelona the Japanese came away with one gold, two silver and three bronze.
Seto who collected a gold in the 400 IM and Hagino who won silver in the 200 IM and 400 freestyle will be representing their nation once again. Currently Hagino sit atop of the world rankings in the 200 and 400 IM and ranks third in the 200 freestyle while Seto is ranked second in both the 200 and 400 IM.
Irie is currently ranked first in the 200 backstroke and second in the 100 backstroke while Koseki is ranked first in the 200 breaststroke and third in the 100 breaststroke.
On the women’s side Watanabe ranks first in the 200 breaststroke, second in the 200 IM and third in the 100 breaststroke.
