Swimming at the 2024 Summer Olympics – Men's 200 metre backstroke

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Men's 200 metre backstroke
at the Games of the XXXIII Olympiad
2024 Swimming at the 2024 Summer Olympics - 2024-07-27 - 3.jpg
Paris La Défense Arena after it was converted to a swimming pool for the swimming events
Venue Paris La Défense Arena
Dates31 July 2024
(Heats and Semis)
1 August 2024
(Final)
Competitors29 from 22 nations
Winning time1:54.26
Medalists
Gold medal icon.svg Hubert Kos Flag of Hungary.svg  Hungary
Silver medal icon.svg Apostolos Christou Flag of Greece.svg  Greece
Bronze medal icon.svg Roman Mityukov Civil Ensign of Switzerland (Pantone).svg  Switzerland
  2020
2028  

The men's 200 metre backstroke event at the 2024 Summer Olympics was held from 31 July to 1 August 2024 at Paris La Défense Arena, which was converted to a swimming pool for the swimming events. [1] Since an Olympic size swimming pool is 50 metres long, each competitor had to swim four lengths of the pool.

The USA's Ryan Murphy and Hungary's Hubert Kós were the favourites going into the event. Other contenders were Great Britain's Luke Greenbank, Hugo González of Spain and Roman Mityukov of Switzerland. Greenbank was eliminated in the heats after getting disqualified for swimming more than 15 metres underwater, while Murphy did not qualify for the final.

In the final, Greece's Apostolos Christou let for the first three quarters of the race, but Kós overtook him on the final 50 metres to win gold with a time of 1:54.26. Christou claimed the silver medal with a national record of 1:54.82, and Mityukov won the bronze with another national record of 1:56.85. France's fourth place finisher, Mewen Tomac also broke his country's national record with 1:55.38, while the seventh place finisher, Pieter Coetze, broke the African record with 1:55.60.

Background

The USA's Ryan Murphy won the event at the 2016 Olympics, won silver at the 2020 Games and won the event at the 2022 World Championships. At the 2023 World Championships, Hungary's Hubert Kós won gold, with Murphy taking silver. Murphy qualified with for the Paris Olympics with a time of 1:54.33 at the US Olympic Trials—the fastest time of the season, where Keaton Jones also qualified with 1:54.61—the third fastest time of the season. [2]

Other competitors included Great Britain's defending Olympic bronze medallist Luke Greenbank, 2024 World Champion Hugo González of Spain, the 2023 Championships bronze medallist and 2024 Championships silver medallist Roman Mityukov of Switzerland, and 2024 Championships bronze medallist Pieter Coetze of South Africa. Russia's defending Olympic champion Evgeny Rylov was not eligible to compete. [a] [2]

SwimSwam predicted Murphy would win and Kós would take second, while Swimming World predicted Kós would win and Murphy would take second. Both predicted Hugo González would take third. [2] [5]

Qualification

Each National Olympic Committee (NOC) was permitted to enter a maximum of two qualified athletes in each individual event, but only if both of them had attained the Olympic Qualifying Time (OQT). [6] For this event, the OQT was 1:57.50. World Aquatics then considered athletes qualifying through universality; NOCs were given one event entry for each gender, which could be used by any athlete regardless of qualification time, providing the spaces had not already been taken by athletes from that nation who had achieved the OQT. [6] [7] Finally, the rest of the spaces were filled by athletes who had met the Olympic Consideration Time (OCT), which was 01:58.09 for this event. [6] In total, 27 athletes qualified through achieving the OQT, two athletes qualified through universality places and one athlete qualified through achieving the OCT. [7]

Top 10 fastest qualification times [7]
SwimmerCountryTimeCompetition
Hubert Kós Flag of Hungary.svg  Hungary 01:54:14 2023 World Aquatics Championships
Ryan Murphy Flag of the United States.svg  United States 01:54:33 2024 United States Olympic Trials
Hugo González Flag of Spain.svg  Spain 01:54:51 2024 Spanish Summer Open Championships
Keaton Jones Flag of the United States.svg  United States 01:54:61 2024 United States Olympic Trials
Roman Mityukov Civil Ensign of Switzerland (Pantone).svg  Switzerland 01:55:34 2023 World Aquatics Championships
Xu Jiayu Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg  China 01:55:37 2022 Asian Games
Apostolos SiskosFlag of Greece.svg  Greece 01:55:42 2024 European Championships
Mewen Tomac Flag of France.svg  France 01:55:54 2024 French Elite Championships
Bradley Woodward Flag of Australia.svg  Australia 01:55:56 2023 Japan Open
Ádám Telegdy Flag of Hungary.svg  Hungary 01:55:57 2024 Hungarian Championships

Heats

Three heats took place on 31 July 2024, starting at 11:21. [b] [8] The swimmers with the best 16 times in the heats advanced to the semifinals. [9] Mityukov qualified with the fastest time of 1:56.62. Kós, Murphy, González, Jones and Coetze all qualified. [10]

Greenbank won the fourth heat but was disqualified for swimming more than 15 metres underwater off the start. [11] [12] China's Xu Jaiyu, the sixth seed for the event, did not show up to his heat, without giving an explanation. [13] [10] Denilson Cyprianos of Zimbabwe lowered his own national record in the event to 2:01.91. [14]

Results [8]
RankHeatLaneSwimmerNationTimeNotes
135 Roman Mityukov Civil Ensign of Switzerland (Pantone).svg  Switzerland 1:56.62Q
242 Lukas Märtens Flag of Germany.svg  Germany 1:56.89Q
326 Pieter Coetze Flag of South Africa.svg  South Africa 1:56.92Q
444 Hubert Kós Flag of Hungary.svg  Hungary 1:57.01Q
534 Ryan Murphy Flag of the United States.svg  United States 1:57.03Q
624 Hugo González Flag of Spain.svg  Spain 1:57.08Q
727 Apostolos Christou Flag of Greece.svg  Greece 1:57.18Q
837Hidekazu TakeharaFlag of Japan.svg  Japan 1:57.23Q
943Apostolos SiskosFlag of Greece.svg  Greece 1:57.26Q
1032 Lee Ju-ho Flag of South Korea.svg  South Korea 1:57.39Q
1145 Keaton Jones Flag of the United States.svg  United States 1:57.54Q
1247 Oliver Morgan Flag of the United Kingdom (3-2).svg  Great Britain 1:57.56Q
1333 Mewen Tomac Flag of France.svg  France 1:57.62Q
1421 Thomas Ceccon Flag of Italy.svg  Italy 1:57.69Q
1522 Yohann Ndoye-Brouard Flag of France.svg  France 1:57.92Q
1646 Ádám Telegdy Flag of Hungary.svg  Hungary 1:57.98Q
1731 Ksawery Masiuk Flag of Poland.svg  Poland 1:58.01
1814 Se-Bom Lee Flag of Australia.svg  Australia 1:58.30
1948 Blake Tierney Flag of Canada (Pantone).svg  Canada 1:58.39
2036 Oleksandr Zheltyakov Flag of Ukraine.svg  Ukraine 1:58.41
2115 Kane Follows Flag of New Zealand.svg  New Zealand 1:58.63
2213David GerchikFlag of Israel.svg  Israel 1:58.79
2328Kai van WesteringFlag of the Netherlands.svg  Netherlands 1:58.99
2438 Matteo Restivo Flag of Italy.svg  Italy 1:59.05
2523 Bradley Woodward Flag of Australia.svg  Australia 2:00.50
2616 Yeziel Morales Flag of Puerto Rico.svg  Puerto Rico 2:00.60
2712 Ziyad Saleem Flag of Sudan.svg  Sudan 2:01.44
2817 Denilson Cyprianos Flag of Zimbabwe.svg  Zimbabwe 2:01.91 NR
25 Xu Jiayu Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg  China DNS
41 Luke Greenbank Flag of the United Kingdom (3-2).svg  Great Britain DSQ

Semifinals

Two semifinals took place on 31 July, starting at 21:47. [15] The swimmers with the best eight times in the semifinals advanced to the final. [9] Kós won the first semifinal with 1:55.96, and Mityukov won the second with 1:56.05. [16] Murphy did not qualify. [17]

Results [15]
RankHeatLaneSwimmerNationTimeNotes
115 Hubert Kós Flag of Hungary.svg  Hungary 1:55.96Q
224 Roman Mityukov Civil Ensign of Switzerland (Pantone).svg  Switzerland 1:56.05Q
325 Pieter Coetze Flag of South Africa.svg  South Africa 1:56.09Q
414 Lukas Märtens Flag of Germany.svg  Germany 1:56.33Q
426 Apostolos Christou Flag of Greece.svg  Greece 1:56.33Q
627 Keaton Jones Flag of the United States.svg  United States 1:56.39Q
721 Mewen Tomac Flag of France.svg  France 1:56.43Q
813 Hugo González Flag of Spain.svg  Spain 1:56.52Q
911 Thomas Ceccon Flag of Italy.svg  Italy 1:56.59
1023 Ryan Murphy Flag of the United States.svg  United States 1:56.62
1112 Lee Ju-ho Flag of South Korea.svg  South Korea 1:56.76
1217 Oliver Morgan Flag of the United Kingdom (3-2).svg  Great Britain 1:57.28
1318 Ádám Telegdy Flag of Hungary.svg  Hungary 1:57.58
1422 Apostolos Siskos Flag of Greece.svg  Greece 1:57.77
1516 Hidekazu Takehara Flag of Japan.svg  Japan 1:58.03
1628 Yohann Ndoye-Brouard Flag of France.svg  France 1:58.65

Final

The final took place at 20:37 on 31 July. [18] Greece's Apostolos Christou led the race at the 50 metre, 100 metre and 150 metre splits. At the 150 metre split he was over a second ahead of Kós in second. [19] [20] Over the final 50 metres, Kós overtook Christou to claim the gold medal, finishing with a time of 1:54.26. Christou won the silver with a national record of 1:54.82, and Mityukov won the bronze with a national record of 1:54.85. [19] France's Mewen Tomac finished fourth with 1:55.38 which was also a new national record. [21] Coetze finished seventh with 1:55.60, which broke the African record set by George Du Rand in 2009. [22] Rand's record was set with a supersuit, before they were banned in 2009. [23]

Kós' win made him the second Hungarian Olympic gold medallist. [24] [25] Christou's second place finish made him the first Greek Olympic medallist in pool swimming since the first Olympics in 1896. [26] SwimSwam said his performance was "one of the biggest surprises of the meet", with him being the oldest swimmer in the final and having the slowest personal best. [27]

Results [18]
RankLaneSwimmerNationTimeNotes
Gold medal icon.svg4 Hubert Kós Flag of Hungary.svg  Hungary 1:54.26
Silver medal icon.svg2 Apostolos Christou Flag of Greece.svg  Greece 1:54.82 NR
Bronze medal icon.svg5 Roman Mityukov Civil Ensign of Switzerland (Pantone).svg  Switzerland 1:54.85 NR
41 Mewen Tomac Flag of France.svg  France 1:55.38 NR
57 Keaton Jones Flag of the United States.svg  United States 1:55.39
68 Hugo González Flag of Spain.svg  Spain 1:55.47
73 Pieter Coetze Flag of South Africa.svg  South Africa 1:55.60 AF
86 Lukas Märtens Flag of Germany.svg  Germany 1:55.97
Statistics [20]
Name50 metre split100 metre split150 metre splitTimeStroke rate (strokes/min)
Hubert Kós 00:27.0600:56.3001:25.381:54.2640.4
Apostolos Christou 00:26.3900:55.1401:24.361:54.8240.3
Roman Mityukov 00:27.1600:56.3601:25.751:54.8543.5
Mewen Tomac 00:27.2500:56.5601:26.441:55.3843.1
Keaton Jones 00:27.3100:56.4001:26.091:55.3942.8
Hugo González 00:26.9900:55.8901:25.721:55.4741.0
Pieter Coetze 00:26.8300:56.5301:25.731:55.6041.7
Lukas Märtens 00:27.1100:56.6001:26.401:55.9741.3

Notes

  1. World Aquatics required Russian athletes to have not shown any support for the Russian invasion of Ukraine to be able to compete as neutral athletes at the Games. [3] Rylov had participated in a pro-war rally so was not elegible. [4]
  2. All times are Central European Summer Time (UTC+2)

References

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  2. 1 2 3 Kaufman, Sophie (16 July 2024). "2024 Olympic Previews: Ryan Murphy Aims To Reclaim 200 Back Gold". SwimSwam . Archived from the original on 12 August 2024. Retrieved 14 February 2025.
  3. Sutherland, James (4 September 2023). "World Aquatics Approves Participation of Russian, Belarusian Athletes As Neutrals". SwimSwam. Archived from the original on 8 December 2024. Retrieved 11 February 2025.
  4. Penland, Spencer (22 April 2022). "FINA Suspends Tokyo 2020 Gold Medalist Evgeny Rylov for 9 Months". SwimSwam. Archived from the original on 6 December 2023. Retrieved 11 February 2025.
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