21st Luxembourg Euro Meet
- When: January 25-27 2019
- Where: d’Coque, Luxembourg
- 50m (Long Course Meters)
- Meet website
- Schedule
- Entry List
When the 21st Luxembourg Euro meet begins on January 25, it will serve as the opening salvo in the newly minted LEN Swimming Cup. This meet also serves as a qualifying event for 2019 FINA World Championship in Gwangju, South Korea. The meet will feature “enhanced TV coverage” since the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) is teaming up with the European swimming federation (LEN) to broadcast the event around the continent: one of several new swimmming events coming to European television this year.
Plenty of European stars such as Katinka Hosszu, David Verraszto and Sarah Sjostrom will be competing at the Euro Meet. In total, 698 athletes, 126 teams and 27 nations will be represented in Luxembourg later this week.
Hosszu will swim in 10 events and the tightest based solely on seed times will be the 200 fly. Only .01 seconds separates Hosszu (2:08.00) from her fellow Hungarian countrywoman Liliana Szilagyi (2:08.01). Hosszu does hold the European record in the event though, which she set back in Rome in 2009. Hosszu only swam the 200 fly long course twice in 2018, with her fastest time being a 2:08.93 on September 7 in Russia.
In the 200 IM, Hosszu, who holds the world record in the event with a time of 2:06.12 set back in Russia in 2015, but her best time in 2018 was just 2:10.06. Switzerland’s Maria Ugolkova was within a second of that, at 2:10.83, at the European Championships last year. If those seeds hold true, it will be a closer battle than Hosszu is used to at this meet. She’s swum, and won, the 200 IM at 4 of the last 5 Euro Meets, by an average of 2.7 seconds (and never less than a second-and-a-half).
Verraszto is swimming in both IM events where he is listed as the top seed. Verraszto won the 400 IM event at the European Championships in 2014, 2016 and 2018.
Sjostrom, who owns the world record in the 100 free after her performance in Budapest last summer, will face off against Hosszu in the event as both swimmers are the top two seeds. Sjostrom was also recently named Swedish female athlete of the year for the fourth consecutive year.
More Swimmers To Watch
- British swimmers Georgia Davies, Polly Holden and Ben Proud are all top seeds in a number of events too.
- Davies will face off against Hosszu in the 100 back. Hosszu is only .14 seconds behind Davies’ seed time for the event.
- Holden is the top seed in the 800 free and her seed time is over 17 seconds faster than the second highest seed. She is also the top seed in the 1500 free and is more than 23 seconds quicker than the second fastest swimmer.
- Proud is the top seed for the 50 free and 50 fly, and both his seed times are over half a second faster from the second highest seed.
Paydays
- In individual events, first place finisher will earn €300, second will earn €200, and third will receive €100.
- The best male and female swimmer at each meet will also receive some money. Based on FINA scoring, the top male and female will earn €1250, the second highest will get €1000 and the third highest total will earn €500.
- There will also be opportunities to earn money for world records and highest team performance. The remaining payouts for individuals and teams can be seen here.
698 swimmers is a lot. I hope besides “old guards” mentioned in the article we will see interesting young emerging European talents.
Also I’m wondering if Hosszu retakes #1 position in 400IM. She hasn’t been there since breaking with Shane Tusup. Currently it is Ledecky who is the best swimmer in this event this year. That is for the first time in her brilliant carrier she earned money (and good one) racing this event and she is on the top of the world list for two weeks already. She is probably very proud of that achievement 😀
P.S. no information about Japanese IMers this season. Loretta keeps it in secret.
I am going to watch the results to see if this is the end of the Iron Lady as we know her from the past few years. I suspect these results will show us she can no longer handle the crazy event schedule like she use to.
Katinka’s days at the top of the 400 IM are coming to a close. She can coast in smaller meets, but at the international level, she really should drop it to focus on shorter events. Strategically, she needs to start thinking about recovery if she wants to stay on top. She’ll be 31 in Tokyo. Ohashi is 23, and Eastin is 21. The 200 fly has stagnated in the absence of Belmonte, who is in the twilight of her career. If I were Katinka, I would focus there and the 200 IM and cede the longer medley.
She can do what she wants
If she is done as 400IMer just 2 years after winning Olympic gold medal in dominant fashion then this 4:26 shown at the age of 27 looks very suspicious.
On the other hand it could be a distinctive feature of this event – very sharp drop from the top. Do you remember 4:28 from 16 years old girl?