Hosszu Stamps Another 11 Races, Hagino Excels On Bergen Final Night

2016 BERGEN SWIM FESTIVAL

• Friday, May 27th – Sunday, May 29th
• Alexander Dale Oen Arena, Bergen, Norway
• Friday – prelims at 3pm local/9am EDT; Saturday – prelims at 9am local/3am EDT, finals 5pm local/11am EDT; Sunday – prelims at 9am local/3am EDT, finals at 3pm local/9am EDT
• Event Schedule
• Entry Lists
• Day 1 Recap/Day 2 Recap
• Live Timing
• Results

The two damage-producing swimmers from abroad that are Hungary’s Katinka Hosszu and Japan’s Kosuke Hagino were back at it again on the final day of the 2016 Bergen Swim Festival.

As a refresher, Hosszu notched 5 wins on the first night of finals, following that up with a remarkable 12 on-the-block appearances last night to add to her Bergen hardware collection. For his part, Hagino nabbed two gold medals last night in the men’s 200m backstroke and 200m freestyle and made anther 2 appearances tonight to leave his mark on this meet.

First, Hosszu fired off another 11 event appearances in tonight’s session, with 6 of those under the umbrella of the women’s 50m breaststroke and 50m backstroke ‘knock-out’-type races. In those sprint distances, Hosszu fell short in the breaststroke, unable to beat Iceland’s Hrafnhildur Luthersdottir through all 3 rounds. Luthersdottir, who already won gold in the women’s 100m breaststroke last night, came out on top of this shorter event and would also go on to win the 200m breaststroke later in the session (2:26.37). Below is a break-down of the women’s breaststroke knock-out:

Round 1 – 50m breaststroke
Luthersdottir – 31.20
Hosszu – 32.01

Round 2 – 50m breaststroke
Luthersdottir – 31.29
Hosszu – 31.78

Round 3 – 50m breaststroke
Luthersdottir – 31.05
Hosszu – 31.70

Immediately after her trio of efforts in breaststroke, Hosszu shifted gears to top the women’s 400m freestyle field, winning gold in that mid-distance race in a time of 4:15.26. Then, the 27-year-old #IronLady moved on to one of her specialty events, the women’s 200m IM, the race in which she is the reigning world record holder. 2:12.58 is what Hosszu earned for her 2nd victory of the night.

But, Hosszu still wasn’t close to being done, competing in both the women’s 50m backstroke knock-out event, 100m butterfly, 200m breaststroke and 100m freestyle. Although far from her best across these additional events, the fact that, for the 2nd night in a row, Hosszu stepped onto the block more than 10 times on each night is enough to earn a medal in itself.

She raced her way to bronze in the women’s 100m butterfly in a time of 1:00.92, to fall behind the 2 sub-minute swimmers on the night – Lucie Svecena in 58.62 and Japan’s Natsumi Hoshi in 59.32. Hosszu competed in the women’s 200m breaststroke, but, as with the 100m distnace from yesterday, was well out of the race and finished 7th overall in a time of 2:39.18. She ended her onslaught of events with the women’s 100m freestyle, where she ended her meet with gold in a mark of 55.11.

Hagino demonstrated the magnitude of his talent by winning the 200m breaststroke and 100m butterfly events tonight. Both are not on his Olympic schedule, which includes the 200m IM, 400 IM and 200 freestyle events, speaking again to the multi-dimensional strength this young talent possesses. 2:13.81 is what it took Hagino to easily win the men’s 200m breaststroke, while he raced his way to the top of the 100 butterfly podium in a time of 52.85. Hagino is considered a strong podium contender across the 3 events he’ll be contesting in Rio.

The home crowd did get to cheer for recent European Championships silver medalist Henrik Christiansen as he soared ahead of the competition in his signature men’s 400m freestyle. Christiansen clocked a time of 3:49.11 to win the event by almost 8 full seconds tonight. The man currently sits as the 8th fastest in the world rankings with his time of 3:46.37 he earned at the Stockholm Open, while 3:46.49 is what he clocked in London to earn the aforementioned silver.