Qin Haiyang Turns In 2:08.87 200 Breast On Night 5 Of 2024 Chinese Nationals

2024 CHINESE NATIONAL SWIMMING CHAMPIONSHIPS

• Friday, April 19th – Sunday, April 27th
• Shenzhen, China
• LCM (50m)
• SwimSwam Preview
• Day 1 Recap/Day 2 Recap/Day 3 Recap/Day 4 Recap
• Results
• Livestream

Day 5 of the 2024 Chinese National Swimming Championship unfolded tonight from Shenzhen with multiple swimmers making the cut for this summer’s Olympic Games.

As a reminder, the individual event times from the 2023 World Championships, 2024 World Championships and this competition will be ranked to determine which swimmers will see their names added to the provisional roster for Paris 2024.

We are keeping track of the lineup as it develops throughout this 10-day competition, with the latest updates included at the bottom of this post.

We already reported how 19-year-old Pan Zhanle unleashed a winning time of 46.97 to take the men’s 100m freestyle, registering the 6th-best performance in the process.

Pan owns the world record, courtesy of the 46.80 notched as lead-off on the Chinese men’s 4x100m free relay in Doha this past February.

• Pan Zhanle’s 46.97 Performance

The women’s edition of the 100m free saw 22-year-old Yang Junxuan take down Zhang Yufei‘s national record.

Yang touched in 52.68 to join Zhang as the only Chinese women ever to have broken the 53-second barrier in the event.

• Yang Junxuan’s 52.68 Chinese National Record

All eyes were on 24-year-old Qin Haiyang in the men’s 200m breast, seeing what he would do as a follow-up to the world record-setting performance of 2:05.48 turned in for gold at last year’s World Championships.

Tonight Qin was on the subdued side but still got the job done, touching in 2:08.87 as the sole swimmer of the pack to dip under the 2:10 barrier.

Behind him was Dong Zhihao, the reigning world junior record holder in this event. Dong logged 2:10.08 and, although that’s off the Olympic Qualification Time of 2:09.68, the 19-year-old already secured his Olympic berth via his 2:07.94 from winning the 200m breast event at this year’s World Championships.

Gao Weizhong won the women’s 1500m free event in a time of 16:06.19, clearing the OQT of 16:09.09 in the process.

Gao is China’s 5th-fastest performer in history, owning a lifetime best of 16:01.13 from last year’s Chinese Nationals.

Li Bingjie‘s time of 15:45.71 from the 2023 World Championships adds her to the list of Olympic qualifiers.

The men’s 200m fly final saw Niu Guangheng get to the wall first, registering a time of 1:55.46. His performance was within half a second of his career-quickest 1:55.05, a time he produced at last year’s Chinese Spring Nationals.

Nearly joining Niu in Olympic qualification was tonight’s silver medalist Xu Fang. The 20-year-old put up 1:56.97, a result just .20 off his lifetime best, but not enough to clear the OQT of 1:55.78.

Semi-Finals

• Olympic multi-medalist Zhang opted out of the women’s 100m free to instead focus on the 200m fly. She topped the field in tonight’s semi-final, registering a time of 2:07.50. She’s already been as fast as 2:05.57, the result she posted for gold at last year’s Asian Games. Gong Zhenqi already dipped under the 2:07.43 World Aquatics Olympic Qualification Time in the heats, hitting 2:08.27 for the 2nd seed. Chen Luying is also in the hunt, holding fast as the 3rd-seeded swimmer in 2:09.22.
• Tang Qianting, China’s newly-minted 100m breaststroke Asian Record holder, was the swiftest in the 200m breast semi-final. She hit 2:26.14 to hold a narrow advantage over 2012 400m IM Olympic champion Yi Shiwen. Yi logged 2:26.53 to flank Tang for tomorrow night’s main event while Zhu Leiju also put her hat into the potential Olympic qualification ring with a time of 2:27.23.
• Olympic medalist Xu Jiayu settled for taking the 2nd seed in the men’s 200m back, putting up a semi time of 1:58.86. Beating the 100m back champion so far was Tao Guannan who touched in 1:57.80 as the only other sub-2:00 athlete tonight. Wang Yutian rounded out the top 3 seeds in 2:00.20.

Chinese Olympic Qualifiers Through Day 5

• Note: times crossed out means a swimmer was faster than the qualifying standard, but was either faster at a prior qualifying meet, or are not in the top two swimmers during the qualifying period.

OQT’s Clocked Thus Far at the 2024 Chinese Nationals

• Men’s 100m free – Pan Zhanle (46.97), Wang Haoyu (48.11)
• Men’s 200m free – Pan Zhanle (1:45.68), Ji Xinjie (1:45.86)
• Men’s 400m free – Pan Zhanle (3:45.58), Zhang Zhanshuo (3:45.82)
• Men’s 800m free – Zhang Zhanshuo (7:47.84), Fei Liwei (7:47.86)
• Men’s 100m back – Xu Jiayu (52.39)
• Men’s 100m breast – Qin Haiyang (58.24), Sun Jiajun (58.73)
• Men’s 200m breast – Qin Haiyang (2:08.87)
• Men’s 200m fly – Niu Guangheng (1:55.46)
• Women’s 100m free – Yang Junxuan (52.68), Wu Qingfeng (53.25)
• Women’s 200m free – Yang Junxuan (1:54.37), Li Bingjie (1:56.29)
• Women’s 400m free – Li Bingjie (4:04.03), Liu Yaxin (4:04.88)
• Women’s 1500m free – Gao Weizhong (16:05.19)
• Women’s 100m back – Wan Letian (59.02), Wang Xueer (59.61)
• Women’s 100m fly – Zhang Yufei (56.36), Yu Yiting (56.82)
• Women’s 100m breast – Tang Qianting (1:04.39), Yang Chang (1:06.79)

OQT’s Clocked From 2023/2024 World Championships

• Men’s 100m free – Pan Zhanle (46.80), Wang Haoyu (48.06)
• Men’s 1500m free – Fei Liwei (14:50.51)
• Men’s 100m back – Xu Jiayu (52.54)
• Men’s 100m breast – Qin Haiyang (57.69), Yan Zibei (59.23)
• Men’s 200m breast – Qin Haiyang (2:05.48), Dong Zhihao (2:07.94)
• Women’s 50m free – Zhang Yufei (24.15), Cheng Yujie (24.45)
• Women’s 100m free – Cheng Yujie (53.39)
• Women’s 200m free – Li Bingjie (1:55.83), Liu Yaxin (1:56.97)
• Women’s 400m free – Li Bingjie (4:01.62), Yang Peiqi (4:05.73)
• Women’s 800m free – Li Bingjie (8:13.31)
• Women’s 1500m free – Li Bingjie (15:45.71)
• Women’s 100m back – Wan Letian (59.49)
• Women’s 200m back – Peng Xuwei (2:06.74)
• Women’s 100m breast – Tang Qianting (1:05.27), Yang Chang (1:06.75)
• Women’s 100 fly – Zhang Yufei (56.12)
• Women’s 200m IM – Yu Yiting (2:08.74)