Peru has declared a five swimmer team for the 2023 World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka, Japan later this month. The team of Alexia Sotomayor, McKenna DeBever, Maria Bramont, Diego Balbi, and Joaquin Vargas will represent the country in the pool in two weeks.
The 2023 World Aquatics Championships will run from July 14-30, with the swimming portion running from July 23-30.
Of those five, only Sotomayor competed at last year’s World Championships, where she just-missed making a semi-final in the women’s 200 back. She placed 17th in 2:16.65, just three-tenths shy of 16th place.
Later in the year, at the South American Games, she improved her personal best to 2:13.80, which would have made the semis at Worlds. That earned her a bronze medal.
Peru only had three swimmers last year.
While there aren’t a lot of holdovers from last year’s team, that doesn’t mean the roster is entirely novice to competition at this level. The American-born DeBever, for example, is the 2021 South American Champion in the 200 IM and represented the country at the 2019 World Championships at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.
DeBever finished 31st in the 100 back and 24th in the 200 IM at the Olympics, where Vargas was the country’s male representation: he was 35th in the 200 free and 25th in the 400 free at that meet.
Most of the team have strong connections to the US: DeBever attended college at Texas A&M, Joaquin Vargas is on the team at Tennessee, Balbi is a high school student in Florida, and Sotomayor, the team’s brightest young stars, also recently moved to Florida. Balbi and Sotomayor are teammates at the Saint Andrew’s School near West Palm Beach.
Bramont trains in Spain.
The team’s three five swimmers all have “B” qualification standards for the meet
Peru’s swimmers shine,
Aqua “B” standards they hold,
World Championships.