Yulia Efimova Goes Sub-30; Ikee on Fire on Day 2 in Canet

2018 MARE NOSTRUM TOUR, CANET-EN-ROUSSILLON

• June 9th-10th
• Bassin Europa, Canet-en-Roussillon, France
• LCM
• Meet Central
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• Entry List
• Results
• Live Results

Battle Across the Atlantic

After Yulia Efimova put up a #1 time in the 100 breaststroke on Saturday at the Mare Nostrum, American Lilly King, some 6000 miles away in Santa Clara, California, answered with a time a tenth faster. When asked after that swim if she was aware of Efimova’s time, King said wryly “of course I did.”

On Sunday, Efimova opened the session with a new target for King, winning the 50 breaststroke in Canet in 29.93. That’s not the world’s best time: an honor which belongs to another American Molly Hannis (29.71 so far), who on Sunday in Canet placed 2nd in 30.34; but, King has indicated that she’ll still notice.

King, by the way, swam 31.61 in prelims on Sunday, but is racing in a very different format, with still 3 more rounds to swim on Sunday evening if she wants to win at the Pro Swim Series meet in California. With Hannis in France racing Efimova, King is the heavy favorite in her 50.

Missy-Watch

Franklin had just 1 swim on Sunday evening, the 100 free, where she posted a 56.32 to finish 4th in the B-Final (12th overall). That was a .12 second improvement from her morning swim and, based on FINA points, that result is worth 773.

Her early returns show that she’s a little further along in her endurance for the 200 meter events than she is in her sprinting for the 100 meter events (which has been the case for most of her career anyway). That’s a good sign for her health and implies that she must be doing heavy training to perform well over 200 meters.

Her 100 back prelims swim on Sunday left her 18th and without a second swim.

She’ll continue racing through the rest of the series, with upcoming stops in Barcelona and Monaco.

Franklin’s results from Canet:

Other Noteworthy Results:

• Britain’s Adam Peaty, the World Record holder in the event, broke a Meet Record in the 50 breaststroke with a 26.73. That’s the 28th time he’s been sub-27 in his career, and is a very similar time to what he normally does in his June in-season races. Japan’s Yasuhiro Koseki was 2nd in 27.19, just missing his own National Record by .07 seconds, while American Michael Andrew finished 3rd in 27.27. Andrew swam a best time of 27.12 in prelims that ranks him as the 4th-best American ever in the event.
• Japan’s Rikako Ikee swam 25.11 in the 50 fly, which breaks the Japanese and Asian Records in the event. She’s now the third-best performer ever in this race, though that still leaves her well behind Sarah Sjostrom’s World Record of 24.43. Belgium’s Kim Buys placed 2nd in 26.04 and Pernille Blume took 3rd in 26.11.
• Ukraine’s Andrii Govorov won the men’s 50 fly in 23.04. That’s the 3rd-best time in the world this year (his old season-best also held that slot at 23.07) behind only Nicholas Santos (22.94) and Ben Proud (22.96). Poland’s Konrad Czeniak took 2nd in 23.59, while Michael Andrew again added time, though a mere .01 seconds, to finish 3rd in 23.70.
• Hungary’s Gergely Gyurta won the men’s 1500 free in 15:10.39, which beat out Japan’s Shogo Takeda (15:12.67) in a timed final.
• Hungarian teen Ajna Kesely swam 4:07.69 to win the women’s 400 free over Russian Anna Egerova (4:09.65). That time for  Kesely is actually more than a second slower than her time from this same meet last year – which was a personal best when she swam it (4:06.42).
• Denmark’s Mie Nielsen dipped under the minute mark to win the women’s 100 back final in 59.88, and was followed there by Canadian Taylor Ruck in 59.97. The two were dead-even throughout the race, with Nielsen having a little more at the end to overtake Ruck’s early lead. Russian Record holder Anastasia Fesikova placed 3rd in 1:00.10, followed by Denmark’s Kira Toussaint in 1:00.75. Katinka Hosszu finished 6th in the race in 1:01.53.
• Japan’s Kanako Watanabe beat out Yulia Efimova in the 200 breaststroke final 2:23.64 to 2:23.85 in what was a two-woman race. Efimova said before Russia’s National Championships that she was focusing on the 50 and 100 this year, and that while she’s till swim the 200, it was going to be more of a ‘whatever she had left’ than a full focus of her training. That’s in spite of being the defending World Champion over 200 meters. That showed on Sunday, where she had a lead at the final turn but was outraced by Watanabe by half-a-second from there forward.
• The defending World Champion Anton Chupkov beat out the World Record holder Ippei Watanabe in the men’s 200 breaststroke final, by a margin of 2:08.81 to 2:09.31. Remember that Watanabe set that World Record in January of 2017 but only came up 3rd at the World Championships; having already declared his intent at breaking the World Record again, but this time at Pan Pacs, seeing him well off that pace in June is no surprise. Yasuhiro Koseki took 3rd in 2:09.19 and Marco Koch was 4th in 2:09.38.
• Hungary’s Lili Szilagyi won the women’s 200 fly in a very-fast June field with a 2:08.49, with Portugal’s Ana-Catarina Monteiro finishing 2nd in 2:08.76. That time for Monteiro crushes her old Portuguese Record of 2:10.10. Hungary finished 1-3-4-5 in this race, including the newest face in the crowd: 15-year old Bianka Berecz, who swam 2:09.87 for 4th. For reference, Katinka Hosszu didn’t go sub-2:10 until she was 20. American Cassidy Bayer placed 6th in 2:10.62.
• Hungary came away with gold in the men’s 200 fly as well, this time in the hands of Tamas Kenderesi, who won in 1:55.78. Denmark’s Victor Bromer was 2nd, more than 2 seconds behind, in 1:57.81.
• In her encore to the earlier Asian Record, Rikako Ikee also won the 100 free in 53.10. That’s just .07 from her own Japanese and Asian Record in that event. Even as the shortest swimmer in the top 3 (she gives up 4 inches to runner-up Ruck, and 2 to 3rd place Bonnet), she still was able to sneak in for a very narrow win: ruck touched in 53.13 and Bonnet in 53.20. Ruck went out very fast in the race, with an opening 50 of 25.44, but Ikee closed like a banshee: her spread was 26.28/26.82 (which is even-split, when accounting for the reaction time off the blocks). Canada finished 1-3-5 in this race, with Kayla Sanchez placing 4th in 54.03 and Rebecca Smith 5th in 55.29. Combined with Penny Oleksiak’s 54.24 from Santa Clara, Canada put up 4 splits of 55.2 or better at different meets around the world this country, including 3 at 54.2 or better – and all of those times are from teenagers.
• Japan picked up another win, with this one coming in the men’s 100 free from Katsumi Nakamura, who finished in 48.89.
• Swiss swimmer Jeremy Desplanches, who trains in France with Olympic Nice Natation, won the men’s 200 IM going-away in 1:58.02. The next-best finisher was Portugal’s Alexis Santos in 2:01.31, followed by American Kieran Smith in 2:01.64. Desplanches really was the best in the field in all 4 phases of the race, but his biggest difference was a 33.9 breaststroke split that earned him more than a second of runway on the field.
• Scottish swimmer Hannah Miley out-battled the defending World Champion and World Record holder Katinka Hosszu in the women’s 400 IM, finishing in 4:39.43 to Hosszu’s 4:39.46. The top 4 finishers were all bunched within half-a-second, with Viktoria Gunes taking 3rd in 4:39.92 and Aimee Willmott taking 5th in 4:39.94. Miley actually out-split Gunes on the breaststroke leg 1:17.70 to 1:17.77 – which matters because Gunes is the 4th-fastest 200 breaststroker in history. American Brooke Forde was 6th in 4:44.01.