2019 LEN EUROPEAN SHORT COURSE CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Wednesday, December 4th – Sunday, December 8th
- Tollcross International Swimming Centre, Glasgow, Scotland
- SCM
- Entry List
- Competition Schedule
- Results
- Live Video – LEN TV
- Day 1 Prelims Recap
Competing on day 1 of the 2019 European Short Course Championships, British backstroking weapon Luke Greenbank established a new national record in the 200m distance to claim the 3rd seed for tonight’s final.
Greenbank entered Glasgow with a SCM 200 back personal best of 1:51.16, a time he registered at the 2018 Swim England Winter Championships. Splitting 54.36/56.80 in that race, the 22-year-old put up the 2nd fastest time ever by a British swimmer, sitting only behind now-retired Olympian Christopher Walker-Hebborn‘s national record of 1:50.73 from 2009.
Flash forward to this morning in Glasgow, however, and Greenbank, the World Championships bronze medalist in the long course version of this event, powered his way to a big-time mark of 1:50.47, less than half a second off of leader Christian Diener of Germany and his time of 1:50.18.
Greenbank opened this morning in a first 50 split of 54.34 and closed in 56.13 to knock .26 off of CWH’s decade-old mark.
Of his morning swim, the Loughborough star stated, “I’m really pleased – it’s always going to hurt swimming a 200m Backstroke short course, so I knew no matter how hard I went it was going to be tough, but I’m really pleased to come out with a PB. I’ll go back and review how the race went, look at my turns and maybe my pacing – I don’t know what my splits were there but I’ve got a plan in my head about what I want to do, so we’ll go and have a look.
“This summer gave me a huge amount of confidence and a big boost, so I’m looking forward to seeing what I can do this season now.”
At the 2017 edition of these European Short Course Championships, Russia’s Kliment Kolesnikov busted out a World Junior Record swim of 1:48.02 to take the gold. With the Russian missing out on this final, finishing well back in 10th, as well as the 2017 bronze medalist Danas Rapsys of Lithuanian opting out of the race this time around, we’ll see at least 2 non-repeat medalists come tonight’s 200m back race.