2022 EUROPEAN AQUATICS CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Thursday, August 11 – Wednesday, August 17, 2022 (pool swimming)
- Rome, Italy
- Parco Del Foro Italico
- LCM (50m)
- Start Times
- Prelims: 9:00 am local / 3:00 am ET
- Finals: 6:00 pm local / 12:00 pm ET
- Meet Central
- Event Schedule
- Entries
- Live Results
- Live Stream
While competing on the penultimate night of these 2022 European Championships, Sarah Sjostrom of Sweden cracked a monumental record.
Her gold tonight in women’s 50m freestyle in a time of 23.91 represented the 28-year-old Olympian’s 27th European Championships medal.
This total overtakes retired Russian sprinter Alexander Popov‘s previous record of having owned the most European Championships medals. From 1991 to 2004, Popov won 26 medals, coming in the 50 freestyle, 100 freestyle and relays.
On the women’s side, below are the all-time winningest European Championships medalists.
All Time Most Medals – Women – Swimming at the European Aquatics Championships
- 27 – Sarah Sjostrom, Sweden – 16 gold, 7 silver, 4 bronze
- 25 – Katinka Hosszu, Hungary – 15 gold, 6 silver, 4 bronze
- 21 – Franziska van Almsick, Germany – 18 gold, 3 silver, 0 bronze
- 21 – Therese Alshammar – 10 gold, 7 silver, 4 bronze
- 18 – Sandra Volker, Germany – 9 gold, 5 silver, 4 bronze
- 18 – Mette Jacobsen, Denmark – 7 gold, 3 silver, 8 bronze
On her history-making swim, Sjostrom said tonight, “I’m super happy with this gold medal. It always makes me happy when I can go under 24sec, even more when I manage to do in a final when it counts the most.
“I think my number of medals continues going up and I’m really enjoying myself here. Now when I look up the stands and I feel the support and energy, I know why I’m doing this and why I want to go on.”
𝙃𝙞𝙨𝙩𝙤𝙧𝙮 𝙄𝙨 𝙈𝙖𝙙𝙚 👏
With her win in the 50m Freestyle, Sarah Sjöström 🇸🇪 overtakes Alexander Popov to claim the record for the most European Championships medals (2️⃣7️⃣)! #LENRoma2022 pic.twitter.com/RKX4YSOHyV
— European Aquatics (@EuroAquatics) August 16, 2022
One of the great champions of the sport of swimming.
She has a lot of medals, but she also has 4 LCM world records still on the books.
She might call it a career after Paris 2024, so let’s enjoy watching her before she moves on to become just a memory and a legend.
I have read in several articles that she plans to keep swimming for a couple of more years and I hope that she will be the swimmer with the most gold medals as well by the time she retires. I also hope that she will have a little more luck going into the next Olympics as she got sick before the 2012 Olympics and fractured her elbow before the 2020 (2021) Olympics.
If she continues like this she’s got a legit chance at taking the 50.
She is the closest thing swimming has to a superhero.
Bow down, people.
Couldn’t have happened to a nicer lady.
she is the most underrated legend, partly because she’s so humble
She’s gonna be far ahead of Katinka by the time they’re both retired.
Both Hosszu and Sjostrom are the epitome of professional swimmer.