Sjostrom Leads 200 Free, 50 Fly Fields At Budapest World Cup Prelims

2018 FINA WORLD CUP – BUDAPEST

• Thursday, October 4th – Saturday, October 6th
• SCM
• Cluster 1 Results
• Entry List
• Results

After Hungarian Katinka Hosszu was the only swimmer to win multiple events on the opening night of competition at the 2018 FINA World Cup in Budapest, Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom is set up to do the same on day 2 after taking a pair of top seeds during Friday’s preliminary session.

Sjostrom heads into finals as the top seed in the 200 free and 50 fly, both events she won at the last stop in Eindhoven, and will look for her first title at the second SC stop after Hosszu beat her on Thursday in the 100 IM and Ranomi Kromowidjojo defeated her in the 50 freestyle.

The 25-year-old leads a loaded field in the 200 free with a time of 1:54.50, followed closely by Chinese teenager Wang Jianjiahe (1:54.97) who is coming off a world record performance on day 1 in the 400 free. Following them you’ve got Femke Heemskerk (1:55.15), who was the runner-up to Sjostrom at the last stop, and Americans Melanie Margalis (1:55.21) and Leah Smith (1:55.93). In Eindhoven, Sjostrom won in a blistering 1:52.25 over Heemskerk (1:52.98) and Wang (1:53.40).

Sjostrom also topped the 50 fly field in an easy 25.02, with Kelsi Dahlia (25.27) of the U.S. and Kimberly Buys (25.64) of Belgium sitting 2nd and 3rd. Kromowidjojo, who was just .06 back of the Swede in the Eindhoven final, qualified 6th in 25.82. The two of them were 24.61 and 24.67 respectively last week.

Hosszu will be hunting down two more victories of her own at finals, as she led the women’s 100 back field and will also swim the timed final of the 400 IM. The Hungarian was an impressive 56.40 this morning in the 100 back, less than a tenth off her finals swim from Eindhoven where she ended up 3rd behind Kathleen Baker and Emily Seebohm. Those two advanced easily in 2nd and 3rd just over a second back of Hosszu.

On the men’s side, Vlad Morozov is on the hunt for two more victories after a very successful opening night, as he won the 50 free in a new World Cup Record and was also just a few one-hundredths off his WR in the 100 IM. Friday morning he qualified 4th into the men’s 50 back (23.86), with Michael Andrew (23.45) leading the pack, and the Russian also advanced through to the 100 free final in 3rd (47.31). Andrew’s countryman Blake Pieroni (47.04) leads the competitive field there which includes Morozov’s teammate Vladislav Grinev (47.25) and Hungary’s Nandor Nemeth (47.35).

The 19-year-old Andrew also qualified 7th into the final of the men’s 50 breast, clocking 26.86 while Slovenian Peter Stevens (26.34) and Russian Kirill Prigoda (26.62) lead the pack. Last stop’s winner Felipe Lima (26.63) and American Nic Fink (26.78) also made the final in 3rd and 6th respectively.

OTHER EVENTS

• Spain’s Hugo Gonzalez leads the men’s 200 IM into the final after his impressive morning swim of 1:55.40, while Hungarians Laszlo Cseh (1:55.88) and David Verraszto (1:56.31) lurk in 2nd and 3rd. Mitch Larkin, Ryosuke Irie and Fink also qualified with 1:57s, but last stop’s winner Daiya Seto didn’t compete.
• Alia Atkinson of Jamaica asserted herself atop the heap in the women’s 100 breast, clocking 1:05.38 to lead Russians Vitalina Simonova (1:05.71) and Yuliya Efimova (1:06.10). In Eindhoven, Efimova edged out Atkinson by three-tenths of a second as both hit 1:03s.
• Instead of the 200 IM, Seto instead opted for the 200 fly, where he took the #2 seed in 1:54.05 behind countryman Yuya Yajima (1:53.90). Cseh (1:55.09) advanced in 3rd, while Eindhoven winner Chad Le Clos (1:55.63) did just enough to qualify in the 8th and final spot.
• The Russians (1:32.15) lead the Netherlands (1:32.18) and the U.S. (1:32.35) in the mixed 4×50 freestyle relay, with notable splits coming from Mariia Kameneva (24.01), Heemskerk (24.04), and Pieroni (21.26). Further down, South Africa (6th) got the top split out of Brad Tandy (21.08), and Spain (8th) had the fastest female leg from Lidon Munoz del Campo (24.00).