Ye Shiwen Produces Strong Front Half In 400 IM Win On Day 1 Of Chinese Nats

2019 CHINESE NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS

  • Wednesday, September 4th – Thursday, September 12th
  • Anshan City, China
  • Prelims at 6 pm local; Finals at 10 am local
  • Results available via Chinese Swim app

The 2019 Chinese National Championships kicked off Wednesday in Anshan City, with the event spanning a full eight days and prelims taking place in the evening and finals in the morning to mirror next summer’s Olympic Games in Tokyo.

Due to the difficulty of following along with results via the Chinese swimming app, following the Chinese Swimming News and Results Twitter account is an easy way to follow along.

Highlighting the opening day was 2012 Olympic gold medalist Ye Shiwen, who won the women’s 400 IM in a time of 4:37.40.

Ye, who won her first Long Course World Championship medals since 2011 this summer in Gwangju (claiming silver in the 200 and 400 IM), took the event by close to four seconds and was faster on the first 200 than she was at Worlds in July.

  • Ye splits, 2019 Worlds: 1:02.87/1:10.23/1:16.97/1:02.00 = 4:32.07
  • Ye splits, 2019 Nationals: 1:02.43/1:09.26/1:19.02/1:06.69 = 4:37.40

Her 4:32.07 from Gwangju was the third-fastest swim of her career, only trailing her swims from the 2012 London Olympics (where she set what is now the former world record in the final at 4:28.43).

Ge Chutong was the runner-up in 4:41.36, and Yu Yiting was third in 4:43.57.

Also winning gold medals on the opening night was Wang Shun and Ji Xinjie.

Wang won the men’s 400 IM in 4:15.26, leading Huang Zhiwei (4:21.06) and Deng Ziqi (4:21.12).

A 2016 Olympic bronze medalist in the 200 IM, Wang holds a best of 4:12.31 from last year, and was significantly faster here than he was at the World Championships (4:23.23).

Ji, a finalist in the men’s 400 free at Worlds, won that event in 3:48.49, followed by Zhang Ziyang (3:51.73). He set his best time in the final in Gwangju in 3:45.64.

Leading the field out of their respective semi-finals was Zhang Yufei (58.13) in the women’s 100 fly and Wang Lizhuo (1:01.26) in the men’s 100 breast.

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Heyitsme
4 years ago

Dang her free was slow

DLSwim
Reply to  Heyitsme
4 years ago

1:06… Maybe she’s in heavy training and had too much front half speed?

Dee
Reply to  DLSwim
4 years ago

Or she was 6s ahead and just eased home after a long season.

anonymoose
Reply to  Dee
4 years ago

this ^

Heyitsme
Reply to  Dee
4 years ago

Maybe but I don’t have a vid of proof

Swammer
Reply to  Heyitsme
4 years ago

Shut it all down, this man on the internet doesn’t have ViDeO pRoOf

MKW
Reply to  Heyitsme
4 years ago

She split at 58.68 to close the 4 IM in London to take gold so safe to say she shut it down or coasted with no competition

Landrew
Reply to  MKW
4 years ago

That was also 7 years ago and she hasn’t exactly been in top form that whole time. I would think she probably shut it down based on being far ahead of the field though

About James Sutherland

James Sutherland

James swam five years at Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ontario, specializing in the 200 free, back and IM. He finished up his collegiate swimming career in 2018, graduating with a bachelor's degree in economics. In 2019 he completed his graduate degree in sports journalism. Prior to going to Laurentian, James swam …

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