2022 JAPANESE SELECTION MEET
- Wednesday, March 2nd – Saturday, March 5th
- Tatsumi International Swimming Centre, Tokyo, Japan
- LCM (50m)
- Selection Meet for 2022 Budapest World Championships, 2022 Asian Games, World University Games
- Results
Full Day 1 Recap to follow.
With the insertion of the 2022 FINA World Championships set for June/July, the Japanese Swimming Federation has determined that its national team selection meet will also serve as the qualification competition for Budapest.
Japan’s best swimmers are taking to the Tatsumi International Swimming Centre from today through Saturday, with roster bids for Budapest, this year’s Asian Games and the World University Games on the line.
Swimmers must score a time at least equal to the far-right column of the timetable seen at the bottom of this post (i.e., 21.82 for the men’s 50m free) in addition to place among the top two swimmers in order to punch their ticket to Budapest.
One swimmer who already accomplished this goal in spades was Reona Aoki in the women’s 100m breaststroke.
Not wasting any time making her presence known, 27-year-old Aoki busted out the fastest performance of her life, hitting the wall in a super swift 1:05.19. That not only demolished the field, with the next closest swimmer coming in at 1:06.97, but Aoki’s result easily dipped under the 1:06.64 threshold needed for Budapest.
Aoki’s 1:05.19 also established a shiny new Japanese national record in the women’s 100m breast event, overtaking the previous mark of 1:05.88 Olympian Kanako Watanabe put on the books way back in 2014 at the Japan Open.
Aoki’s splits for tonight’s powerful outing included 30.54/34.65 to make history, as well as smash her own previous lifetime best of 1:05.90 from nearly 4 years ago.
On a continental level, Aoki’s monster swim here also checks in as a new Asian Record. The previous standard stood at the 1:05.32 Ji Liping put up during the supersuit era of 2009.
Worldwide, Aoki’s time here now checks her in as the 10th fastest performer of all-time, with her mark here having beaten what it took to snag silver at the 2020 Olympic Games.
Wow wtf
27 is a golden age for Japanese female breaststrokers. Rie Kaneto won Olympic gold at 27 in Rio.
Fun Fact: Japan’s mastery of breaststroke is so complete that they have both the youngest and oldest female Olympic breaststroke gold medalists. The aforementioned Kaneto is the oldest, and the youngest is Kyoko Iwasaki, who had just turned 14 six days before winning the 200m breast in Barcelona 1992 (still the youngest-ever Olympic winner in swimming altogether).
Yes & she received death threats on her return to Japan . Why was that one would ask ? Japan male centred bully culture just did not like girls succeeding.
that is swift
nice Aoki!