D’Artagnan Dias contributed to this report.
Wednesday begins the 2014 Portuguese Open Championships in Oeiras with the men’s and women’s 1500 freestyle events.
Those fields are pretty indicative of where the competition level will be at this meet, with Portugal not currently turning out much in the way of elite internationals, but there will be two big exceptions:
1) A group of British juniors will be at the meet
2) A group of Swedes will be at the meet – including the world’s most recent World Record breaker – Sarah Sjostrom.
Just over two weeks ago, Sjostrom swam one of the most stunning World Records that we’ve seen since the end of the rubber suit era, putting in a 24.43 in the 50 fly.
Now she’ll be back in the water in Portugal with a handful of Swedish teammates (Simon Sjodin, Erik Persson, Mattias Carlsson, Peter Fredriksson, Ida Lindborg, Michelle Coleman, Joline Hostman, Jennie Johansson, Louise Hansson, Stina Gardell, Magdalena Kuras).
Sjostrom will put her swimming to the test in an indoor pool, testing the theory that her World Record might have been wind-aided.
In addition to the 50 fly, she’s also entered to swim the 50 free, 100 free, the 100 fly at the meet. The 50 fly will come on Thursday, and we’ll keep you up to date all weekend.
I would love to see her swim another 400 free before Europeans. I know it’s not in her realm of big meet racing events, but that 4:06 was stunning for a sprinter who never swims races beyond 200s.
BTW – she was a DNS for the 50 fly.