2019 Israel Short Course Winter Championships
- December 25-28, 2019
- Wingate Institute Israel Arena
- Netanya, Israel
- SCM (25m)
- Meet Central (with result links)
A total of seven national records were broken over four days at the 2019 Israeli Short Course Winter Championships held at the Wingate Institute in Netanya, the same site as the 2015 European SC Championships.
Leading the record charge was 22-year-old Meiron Cheruti, who walked away with three new Israeli marks in the men’s 50 free, 100 free and 50 fly.
Cheruti first knocked off his 50 free record of 21.27 in the heats with a swim of 21.26, and then blasted his way to a 21.08 in the final. In the 100 free, he erased his previous mark of 47.41 with a finishing time of 47.08. Both records were set at the 2018 edition of this meet.
In the 50 fly the record also fell in both the prelims and finals. In the morning, 27-year-old Marcus Schlesinger became the first Israeli man to go sub-23 in 22.88, breaking his 2016 national record of 23.02. Then, in the final, it was Cheruti who slipped under it for a new mark of 22.86.
Schlesinger also saw his 100 fly record taken away, as Tomer Frankel clocked in at 50.60 to take down Schlesinger’s 51.35 from 2016.
In the men’s 200 breaststroke, two-time Olympian Yakov Toumarkin chopped nearly a full second off of a 10-year-old national record in a time of 2:05.87, lowering Gal Nevo‘s 2:06.85 from 2009.
Cheruti (50 free) and Frankel (100 fly) are two of the four athletes who have solidified 2020 Olympic qualifying times for Israel, joined by Anastasia Gorbenko and Ron Polonsky in the women’s and men’s 200 IM respectively. Polonsky, 18, set four Israeli Youth Records in Netanya, doing so in the 100 IM (54.11), 100 back (53.29 prelims, 52.88 final) and the 400 IM (4:09.67).
Also lowering Youth National Records were Aviv Barzelay in the women’s 200 back (2:08.15), Chris Pichugin in the men’s 50 breast (27.42) and Gal Cohen Groumi in the men’s 200 IM (1:56.98).
