2023 TOKYO SWIMMING CENTER INVITATIONAL
The 2023 Tokyo Swimming Center Invitational wrapped up this weekend with the long course meet representing a fine-tuning opportunity before next month’s Japan Open.
National record holder Takeshi Kawamoto dove in a trio of times, taking on the 50m fly, 50m back and 100m fly events.
In the 50m back, the 28-year-old posted a winning time of 25.32 to take the gold. Behind him was Yura Masaki who clocked 25.55 while Toya Hirata also landed on the podium in 25.77 for bronze. Hirata’s time checked in as a new National Junior High School Record.
Kawamoto snagged silver in the men’s 50m fly where he logged a result of 23.64. That got him to the wall just .03 behind winner Yuya Tanaka who clocked 23.61 as the top man. Kawamoto owns the national record in the 50m fly with his lifetime best of 23.13 notched at this year’s Japan World Trials.
Kawamoto’s 51.87 was good enough for gold in the 100m fly and represented the sole outing under the 52-second barrier. Spitting 24.18/27.68, Kawamoto beat out Naoki Mizunuma who settled for silver in 52.77 while Tanaka rounded out the top 3 in 53.02.
The men’s 200m fly saw Genki Terakado top the podium at 1:56.44. He beat the field by over 2 seconds, with his performance now rendering him the 7th-swiftest man in the world on the season.
In the men’s 50m breast event, Taku Taniguchi got it done for gold in a mark of 27.20, a new Japan Student Record. The Chukyo University is now Japan’s 6th-best performer of all time in this race.
Additional men’s winners included Hidenari Mano taking the 200m free in 1:47.46, So Ogata winning the 200m IM in 1:59.67 and Katsumi Nakamura topping the 50m free podium in 22.31.
For the women, Ageha Tanigawa got it done for gold in the women’s 400m IM, producing a time of 4:40.70 to win by 3 seconds.
Tanigawa also topped the 200m fly podium in 2:10.45 over World Championships finalist Airi Mitsui who clocked 2:10.97 for silver.
Ai Soma was the winner across both the 50m and 100m fly events. She posted a time of 26.18 in the former and 57.99 in the latter to come out on top.
@Retta Race, Not relevant to article but Matt Richards raced regionals over the weekend, went slower in the 50, about the same in the 100, and quicker in the 200 compared to the same meet last year:
https://www.swimwest.org.uk/file/winter-champs-2023-full-results.pdf
Jimmy Guy also looked decent after his move to Millfield.
Thanks!