EINDHOVEN QUALIFICATION MEET (NED)
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- April 9th – April 11th
- Prelims at 9:30am local/Finals at 4:30pm local
- Pieter van den Hoogenband Stadium
- Olympic Selection Policy
- One of several OLY qualifying opportunities
- SwimSwam Preview
- Live Results
- Live Stream
The Eindhoven Qualification Meet brought the heat on day 1, with Arno Kamminga, Femke Heemskerk, Ranomi Kromowidjojo and more taking to the Pieter van den Hoogenband Stadium waters.
We reported how Kamminga clocked a new national record right off the bat in the men’s 50m breast. He turned in a time of 26.80 to have .08 off of his previous PB from last December. You can read more about Kamminga’s performance here.
In an Olympic roster-impacting race, Femke Heemskerk retrieved her 50m freestyle spot back from Valerie van Roon.
You can read the background on the Heemskerk/van Roon situation in the SwimSwam Preview link above.
The Olympic veteran already nailed a new personal best this morning in 24.28 to stake her claim on the 50m free roster spot behind Kromo. That was enough to beat van Roon’s 24.63 she put up at the Rotterdam qualification meet that had qualified her in Heemskerk’s absence there.
Heemskerk sealed the deal once again this evening with a silver medal-worthy 24.43 to get to the wall right behind Ranomi Kromowidjojo. Kromo clocked 24.11 to now be positioned as the 2nd fastest performer this season. Van Roon settled for 3rd in 24.84, which leaves her now off the Dutch Olympic roster.
The men’s 50m free saw Jesse Puts snag the gold medal in a mark of 21.87, the only sub-22 second result of the field. That was after Thom de Boer posted a big-time 21.79 swim unshaved and untapered in the morning heats.
Coming painstakingly close to Olympic qualification was Nyls Korstanje, the NC State Wolfpack member who went after the 100m fly event. Registering the fastest time of his career, Korstanje split 23.93/28.0 to ultimately stop the clock in 51.93. This marks his first time ever under 52 seconds, but he needed just a fingernail more to nab the Olympic-qualifying time of 51.92.
Not quite as close, but still a similar situation was Sharon van Rouwendaal in the women’s 200m backstroke. The open water ace scored a time of 2:10.42 to top the 2back podium tonight, but she needed to beat the KNZB-mandated qualification time of 2:10.19 to add her name to the Olympic roster.
Luckily van Rouwendaal got it done on that front in the morning, registering a time of 2:09.72. She opened in 1:03.07 and closed in 1:06.65 to get well under the cut. As did Kira Toussaint, the national record holder in the 100m back. Toussaint touched in 2:10.02 in the AM to also notch a time good enough for Rio.
So incredibly stupid for these federations to impose harder times than what FINA sets. Why not have more olympians? Never know who’s gonna have an amazing meet and surprise people
Yeah think about the US men in 2012 when the 400 free at trials was relatively slow. Vanderkaay and Dwyer 3:47.6 and 3:47.8 just under the FINA cut.
They ended up placing 3rd and 5th at the games. These European countries wouldn’t have sent them!
Ehh, to save money? Too costly to bring swimmers that probably wont make the final to the games. It’s unfortunate, but the KNZB has a lot less money available then USA Swimming
It is quiet simple. The Dutch NOC has limited money to spend. For all individual sports participating at the olympics they have a single rule: Qualification is based on a cleaned list of the 16 best times worldwide (2 swimmers per country). What if they make exceptions for one athlete based on 0.01. The someone else in a different sport wants to have the exception as well.
For athletics it is the same. Teamsports are different (due to global rules).
Was this Korstanje’s last chance to qualify?
No. Budapest for EK is last chance.
Both Kira Toussaint and Sharon van Rouwendaal swam under the qualification time for the 200 back this morning.
As far as I know, and what they were saying during the livestream this morning, is that both Kira and Sharon are qualified for the 200 m backstroke due to the morning swims 🙂