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Swimming at the 2018 Asian Games was held at the GBK Aquatic Center, Jakarta, Indonesia from 19 to 24 August 2018.
China were firm favorites in the competition, having claimed 22 Golds, 12 Silvers, and 13 Bronze and would be looking to increase the same at this year's game. Japan came second with 12 Golds, 21 Silvers, and 13 Bronze and will be eyeing to convert the Silvers into Gold. Kazakhstan took 3 Gold and 2 Silver to be placed third.
Men's 50m Freestyle
Hexin Yu of China sped away in a time of 22.11 to claim the Gold in the 50m Freestyle. He also led the field in the qualifications with a timing of 22.21 asserting that he is the one to watch out for. He had the second best reaction time of 0.63 of a second in the finals.
The Indian, Virdhawal Vikram Khade had a good race and missed out on the Bronze by one-hundredth of a second. He had a good start, with a reaction time of 0.65 but could not get into the medals tally and finished in the 4th spot. If Khade had replicated his qualification timing of 22.43 he would have taken home the Bronze medal. However, in the qualifier, he has indeed broken the Indian National Record in the 50m Freestyle which stood at 22.71 set in 2009 by him.
Results: Gold - Hexin Yu (CHN) 22.11, Silver - Katsumi Nakamura (JPN) 22.20, Bronze - Shunichi Nakao (JPN) 22.46, 4th Place - Virdhawal Vikram Khade (IND) 22.47, 28th Place - Anshul Kothari (IND) 23.83.
Men's 100m Freestyle
Shinri Shioura of Japan ensured that he claimed the Gold after missing the yellow metal at the Incheon Games. He led the field right from the start and did not let anyone take over the top spot. Shioura had a quiet qualification where he came third overall but stepped up the game when it was most needed to pocket the Gold.
Results: Gold - Shinri Shioura (JPN) 48.71, Silver - Katsumi Nakamura (JPN) 48.72, Bronze - Hexin Yu (CHN) 48.88, 27th Place - Aaron D'Souza (IND) 51.50, 43rd Place - Virdhawal Vikram Khade (IND) 59.11.
Men's 200m Freestyle
Silver medalist at the 2014 Asian Games, Sun Yang won the Gold at the 2018 Asian Games. He topped the qualifications with a time of 1:47.58 and improved it to 1:45.43 to claim his first Gold. At the 50m marker, he was 5th and improved it to 4th at the end of 100m. Then he stepped up the pace to reclaim the top spot at the end of 150m and lead all the way to the finish.
India's Saurabh Sangvekar finished 24th overall with a time of 1:54.87 and finished second in his heat.
Results: Gold - Sun Yang (CHN) 1:45.43, Silver - Katsuhiro Matsumoto (JPN) 1:46.50, Bronze - Ji Xinje (CHN) 1:46.68, 24th Place - Saurabh Sangvekar (IND) 1:54.87.
Men's 400m Freestyle
Defending champion Sun Yang retained the Gold medal in the 400m Freestyle event. Hagino of Japan was unable to retain the Silver medal he won in 2014 as he was pushed to the third place by his Japanese compatriot. Sun Yang was placed 4th till the 100m mark and then in the next 100, he pushed his way to the second spot. From the 300 mark, he increased the pace to take the lead and maintained it until the end.
Results: Gold - Sun Yang (CHN) 3:42.92, Silver - Naito Ehara (JPN) 3:47.14, Bronze - Kosuke Hagino (JPN) 3:47.20.
Men's 800m Freestyle
This is a new event introduced at the Asian Games 2018 and Sun Yang capitalized to become the first Gold medalist at the Games. He swam an extremely tactical race which saw him in the 3rd place till 150m, then moved into 2nd spot till 300m and then lead the race until the end.
Advait Page broke the National Record in this event and finished a creditable 8th.
Results: Gold - Sun Yang (CHN) 7:48.36 (Games Record), Silver - Shogo Takeda (JPN) 7:53.01, Bronze - Nguyen Huy Hoang (VIE) 7:54.32 (National Record), 8th Place - Advait Page (IND) 8:09.13 (National Record).
Men's 1500m Freestyle
Sun Yang retained the Gold medal and was inside the top 3 until he sped away at the last 250m to take the Gold. Vietnam's Hoang improved upon his Bronze in the 800 to a Silver in this event and have put Vietnam on the swimming map.
Results: Gold - Sun Yang (CHN) 14:58.53, Silver - Nguyen Huy Hoang (VIE) 15:01.63 (National Record), Bronze - Ji Xinje (CHN) 15:06.18, 7th Place - Advait Page (IND) 15:29.96.
Men's 50m Backstroke
Xu ensured that he did not face a repeat of what happened in 2014 where he got the Bronze, by claiming the Gold. Ryosuke however, had to be content with the Silver medal that he won in 2014 too.
Results: Gold - Xu Jiayu (CHN) 24.75, Silver - Ryosuke Irie (JPN) 24.88, Bronze - Kang Ji-Seok (KOR) 25.17. 10th Place - Srihari Nataraj (IND) 26.19 (National Record), 21st Place - Arvind Mani (IND) 26.89.
Men's 100m Backstroke
Xu dominated the event right from the start and wrested the Gold medal from Japan by producing a Games record time of 52.34.
Results: Gold - Xu Jiayu (CHN) 52.34 (Equals Games Record), Silver - Ryosuke Irie (JPN) 52.53, Bronze - Lee Ju-Ho (KOR) 54.52. 8th Place - Srihari Nataraj (IND) 55.86 (National Record), 16th Place - Arvind Mani (IND) 58.09.
Men's 200m Backstroke
Xu ensured that he did not go empty-handed without a Gold as in 2014, and completely swept the Gold at all the three backstroke events.
Results: Gold - Xu Jiayu (CHN) 1:53.99 (National Record), Silver - Ryosuke Irie (JPN) 1:55.11, Bronze - Keita Sunama (KOR) 1:55.54. 6th Place - Srihari Nataraj (IND) 2:02.83 (National Record), 12th Place - Advait Page (IND) 2:06.85.
Men's 50m Breaststroke
Yan Zibei who destroyed the Games record and the National record during the qualification process was unable to repeat the same in the finals and ended up with the Silver as Koseki of Japan claimed the Gold. Defending champion Balandin took the Bronze. 2014 Bronze medalist Sejwal had to be content with a 7th place finish.
Results: Gold - Yasuhiro Koseki (JPN) 27.07, Silver - Yan Zibei (CHN) 27.25, Bronze - Dmitriy Balandin (KAZ) 27.46. 7th Place - Sandeep Sejwal (IND) 27.98.
Men's 100m Breaststroke
Koseki pocketed his second Gold and pushed the defending champion Balandin to the 3rd spot.
Results: Gold - Yasuhiro Koseki (JPN) 58.86 (Games Record), Silver - Yan Zibei (CHN) 59.31, Bronze - Dmitriy Balandin (KAZ) 59.39. 10th Place - Sandeep Sejwal (IND) 1:02.07.
Men's 200m Breaststroke
Koseki took home his third Gold dominating the Breaststroke events at the Jakarta games. He led from the start, but was run close by his partner Watanabe and finished one-hundredth of a second quicker to claim the Gold.
Results: Gold - Yasuhiro Koseki (JPN) 2:07.81, Silver - Ippei Watanabe (JPN) 2:07.82, Bronze - Qin Hayang (CHN) 2:08.07.
Men's 50m Butterfly
Schooling ensured that he was the man to beat by finishing first in the qualification and bettering his timing in the finals to claim Gold. Khade from India broke his National record during the qualification with a timing of 24.09.
Results: Gold - Joseph Schooling (SGP) 23.61, Silver - Wang Peng (CHN) 23.65, Bronze - Adilbek Mussin (KAZ) 23.73 (National Record). 8th Place - Virdhawal Vikram Khade (IND) 24.48, 28th Place - Anshul Kothari (IND) 25.45.
Men's 100m Butterfly
Schooling produced a Games record performance to take the Gold in the 100m butterfly.
Results: Gold - Joseph Schooling (SGP) 51.04 (Games Record), Silver - Li Zhuhao (CHN) 51.46, Bronze - Yuki Kobori (JPN) 51.77. 12th Place - Sajan Prakash (IND) 54.06, 26th Place - Avinash Mani (IND) 56.98.
Men's 200m Butterfly
Seto had a see-saw race as he went into the lead in the first 50m and then lost it to Li of China in the next 100m. He pushed the pace in the final 50m to ensure that he got the Gold.
Results: Gold - Daiya Seto (JPN) 1:54.53, Silver - Nao Horomura (JPN) 1:55.58, Bronze - Li Zhuhao (CHN) 1:55.76. 5th Place - Sajan Prakash (IND) 1:57.75 (National Record).
Men's 200 m Individual Medley
Wang of China was in the third spot at the end of the Butterfly leg. In the backstroke leg, he moved up a place to second. He was in the 4th spot in the Breaststroke the weakest style of his 4 and then shot to lead in the Freestyle.
Results: Gold - Wang Shun (CHN) 1:56.52, Silver - Kosuke Hagino (JPN) 1:56.75, Bronze - Qin Hayang (CHN) 1:57.09. 14th Place - Neel Roy (IND) 2:08.07.
Men's 400 m Individual Medley
Seto led the field from start to finish to pocket his second Gold in the Asian Games.
Results: Gold - Daiya Seto (JPN) 4:08.79, Silver - Kosuke Hagino (JPN) 4:10.30, Bronze - Wang Shun (CHN) 4:12.31.
Men's 4 × 100 m Freestyle Relay Results:
Japan produced a Games record to clinch the Gold, whereas China and Singapore produced National Records.
The Indian relay team set a National record in the 4 x 100m Freestyle Relay.
Gold - Japan 3.12.68 (Games Record) - Shinri Shioura (48.85), Katsuhiro Matsumoto (47.65), Katsumi Nakamura (48.08), Juran Mizohata (48.10)
Silver - China 3.13.29 (National Record) - Yang Jintong (49.24), Cao Jiwen (48.29), Sun Yang (48.38), Yu Hexin (47.38).
Bronze - Singapore 3.17.22 (National Record) - Quah Zheng Wen (49.64), Joseph Schooling (48.27), Darren Chua (49.64), Darren Lim (49.67).
8th Place - India 3:25.34 - Aaron D'Souza (51.46), Anshul Kothari (51.61), Sajan Prakash (51.45), Virdhawal Khade (50.82).
Men's 4 × 200 m Freestyle Relay Results:
Japan once again came up with a Games record performance to take the Gold.
The Indian relay team set a National record in the 4 x 200m Freestyle Relay.
Gold - Japan 7.05.17 (Games Record) - Naito Ehara (1:47.31), Reo Sakata (1:46.51), Kosuke Hagino (1:46.50), Katsuhiro Matsumoto (1:44.85).
Silver - China 7.05.45 - Ji Xinjie (1:47.58), Shang Keyuan (1:47.15), Wang Shun (1:46.53), Sun Yang (1:44.19).
Bronze - Singapore 7.14.15 (National Record) - Quah Zheng Wen (1:48.31), Joseph Schooling (1:46.66), Danny Yeo (1:49.23), Jonathan Tan (1:49.95).
7th Place - India 7:37.07 - Srihari Nataraj (54.26), Saurabh Sangvekar (55.07), Avinash Mani (56.07), Neel Roy (53.83).
Men's 4 × 100 m Medley Relay Results:
China sets an Asian record, on way to winning the Gold in the Medley Relay event.
The Indian relay team set a National record in the 4 x 100m Medley Relay.
Gold - China 3.29.99 (Asian Record) - Xu Jiayu (52.60), Yan Zibei (58.86), Li Zhuhao (50.61), Yu Hexin (47.92).
Silver - Japan 3.30.03 (National Record) - Ryosuke Irie (52.53), Yasuhiro Koseki (58.45), Yuki Kobori (51.06), Shinri Shioura (47.99).
Bronze - Kazakhstan 3.35.62 (National Record) - Adil Kaskabay (55.53), Dmitriy Balandin (58.88), Adilbek Mussin (52.44), Alexandr Varakin (48.77).
9th Place - India 3:44.94 (National Record) - Srihari Nataraj (56.31), Sandeep Sejwal, Sajan Prakash (53.43), Aaron D'Souza.
Mixed 4 × 100 m Medley Relay Results:
China crushed the Asian record in the Mixed 100m Medley relay to take the Gold. Koreans broke their National record to take the Bronze.
Gold - China 3.40.45 (Asian Record) - Xu Jiayu (52.30), Yan Zibei (58.45), Zhang Yufei (56.61), Zhu Menghui (53.09).
Silver - Japan 3.41.21 - Ryosuke Irie (52.55), Yasuhiro Koseki (58.95), Rikako Ikee (55.68), Tomomi Aoki (54.03).
Bronze - South Korea 3.49.27 (National Record) - Lee Ju-ho (55.36), Moon Jae-Kwon (), An Se-Hyeon (57.93), Ko Mi-so ().
Medal Standings
Japan overtook China at these games by garnering 19 Gold, 20 Silver and 13 Bronze. China came second with 19 Gold, 17 Silver and 14 Bronze. Singapore was third with 2 Gold, 1 Silver and 3 Bronze.
An exciting swimming at the Asian games 2018, as we saw an Asian record being set, 5 Games record broken and one Games record been equalled.
Indian's had a good outing in the Swimming event, even though they did not win a medal they promised a lot of improvement by shattering National records in 10 events of the 17 they had participated in. Khade came in with a 4th place finish missing the Bronze by a whisker.
