Budapest 2024, Day 2 Finals: Neutral Athletes Set European Record in Mixed 200 Medley Relay
The return to competition of athletes from Russia and Belarus showed its impact on Wednesday at the 2024 World Short-Course Championships, with the Neutral Athletes winning the mixed 200 medley relay to cap the session at the Duna Area.
Miron Lifintsev, Kirill Prigoda, Arina Surkova and Daria Trofimov – all of whom hail from Russia – went 1:35.36 for a wire-to-wire win. It resets the European record and is within .21 seconds of the world record that the Americans set in winning this event in 2022.
Canada continued an excellent meet by securing bronze. The team of Kylie Masse, Finlay Knox, Ilya Kharun and Ingrid Wilm went 1:35.94. Wilm’s split of 23.81 did enough to hold off the charge by the Americans on the anchor leg, the U.S. settling for bronze in 1:36.20.
It was a big session for the Neutral Athletes. Lifintsev set a world junior record en route to winning the men’s 100 backstroke, lowering the mark of countryman Kliment Kolesnikov. Much of Lifintsev’s brief career has been with Russia in the international wilderness for major competitions following its 2022 invasion of Ukraine, which led to exclusion from the Paris Olympics among other major events. Prigoda set the fastest time in the semifinals of the men’s 100 breast, and Surkova was fourth in the 50 fly.
That quick front half dared the field to come chase them, and they never got there. Kharun surged Canada into second after his fly split. The U.S. was in the top three all the way. Shaine Casas was nearly a half-second down on Lifintsev to start the race, and Michael Andrew was .35 off of Prigoda’s split. Regan Smith’s 24.90 was only fourth-fastest among the female butterfliers, and while Katharine Berkoff’s 23.16 was the quickest female anchor leg (tied with Sara Curtis of Italy), it wasn’t enough.
Canada had set the pace in prelims in 1:37.26, .02 ahead of Sweden. Both fielded unchanged rosters for the finals. Canada dropped more than a second. Sweden improved by only two tenths, never a factor in finishing sixth.
The U.S. was third in prelims 1:37.50, then swapped in Andrew for AJ Pouch and rebuilt the back half completely, replacing Alex Shackell and Alex Walsh from the morning. Shackell split 25.04, Walsh 23.26, both of marginally improved in finals. Pouch was 26.33 in the morning, with Andrew quicker by eight tenths. Casas was 22.87 in the morning and 22.85 at night.
The Australians set the Oceania record in both prelims and finals. Iona Anderson, Joshua Yong, Matthew Temple and Meg Harris went 1:37.77 in the morning, then Isaac Cooper, Yong, Alexandria Perkins and Harris went 1:36.78 at night. They edged Italy by .02, with Curtis coming home hard.
Japan finished seventh in an Asian record 1:37.29.
