By Retta Race on SwimSwam
2021 LEN EUROPEAN SHORT COURSE CHAMPIONSHIPS
Tuesday, November 2nd – Sunday, November 7th
Aquatics Palace, Kazan Russia
SCM (25m)
Day 1 Prelim Recap
Live results
The top finishing team in this heated men’s 4x50m freestyle relay destroyed its respective national record, as the Netherlands just out-touched Italy by only .03.
The Dutch foursome of Jesse Puts, Stan Pjinenburg, Kenzo Simons and Thom de Boer combined to stop the clock in a monster mark of 1:22.89. That garnered them the gold ahead of the Italian squad of Alessandro Miressi, Thomas Ceccon, Lorenzo Zazzeri and Marco Orsi who settled for silver in a super quick result of their own in 1:22.92.
For the Dutch, their time here tonight at the first finals session of these European Short Course Championships obliterated the previous national standard of 1:24.43. Three of the four teammates tonight were on that relay, which posted the outing at the 2020 Amsterdam Christmas meet.
Splits for the previous and new records are below:
Old Dutch Record – 1:24.43
Puts – 21.08
Ties Elzerman – 21.91
Simons – 20.65
de Boer – 20.79
New Dutch Record – 1:22.89
Puts – 21.10
Pjinenberg – 20.74
Simons – 20.59
de Boer – 20.46
The primary game-changers this time around included Pjinenberg splitting over a second faster than Elzerman did in Amsterdam.
Also, de Boer, an Olympic finalist in the LCM 50 free from Tokyo, also was much quicker, shaving .33 off of the 20.79 anchor he logged in the previous record. He was the quickest of the field tonight besides Russia’s Kliment Kolesnikov who wrapped up his nation’s relay in 20.45 for bronze.
Puts posted the fastest opening 50m of the field with his 21.10, with the next closest represented by Italy’s Alessandro Miressi‘s 21.20. Of note, the fastest split of the entire field on any leg rested at Lorenzo Zazzeri‘s mind-blowing 20.24 on Italy’s 3rd leg.
For their part, the runner-up Italians finished just .02 outside of the 1:22.90 national standard put on the books at the 2018 FINA World Short Course Championships.
According to FINA rankings, the Dutch time of 1:22.89 renders the squad as 4th fastest performers of all-time in this men’s SCM 4×50 free event.
All-Time Men’s SCM 4×50 Free Relay Performers
France – 1:20.77, 2008
USA – 1:21.80, 2018
Russia – 1:22.22, 2018
Netherlands – 1:22.89, 2021
Read the full story on SwimSwam: Dutch Men Destroy 200 Free Relay Record En Route To Euro SC Gold
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