South Africa swimmers shine at World Aquatics Junior Championships
St Benedict’s College and Durban High School (DHS) have every reason to celebrate after two of their learners, Kris Mihaylov and Cole Martin, delivered exceptional performances at the World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships in Bucharest, Romania.
The event ran over six days from 19 to 24 August and brought together the world’s best junior swimmers.
Mihaylov stole the spotlight by clinching gold in the 200m butterfly.
His victory follows closely on the heels of Pieter Coetze‘s record-breaking backstroke triumphs at the World Aquatics Championships in Singapore – gold in the 100m backstroke and silver in the 50m and 200m backstroke – and shines a bright light on South Africa’s swimming future.
Mihaylov, who is better known for his freestyle achievements and is coached by former world 50m freestyle record holder, Peter Williams, qualified for the final with an outstanding swim in the morning heats, stopping the clock at 1:58.17.
In the final, he swam a strong first 100m split of 55.52 seconds, which left him 0.71 seconds clear of Hungary’s David Antal, and more than two seconds up on the rest.
He, then, powered home to touch the wall in 1:56.16, which bettered his personal best of 1:58.18 by more than two seconds. Behind him, Antal claimed silver in 1:56.87, while Turkey’s Tuncer Erturk took bronze in 1:58.14.
The 17-year-old’s Mihaylov’s remarkable swim delivered South Africa’s only gold medal, but DHS standout, Cole Martin, at only 15 years of age, caught the eye in breaststroke events.
Competing over all three distances, he produced superb times of 30:36 from the 50m, 1:06.24 for the 100m, and 2:28.35 for the 200m. With time on his side, he’ll be someone to watch out for over the next couple of years.
