SWIMMING – BAHRAIN’S star swimmer Mikhail Arkhangelskiy came four-tenths of a second short of stepping onto the podium yesterday in the men’s 100 metres butterfly at the 20th Asian Games in Aichi-Nagoya, Japan.
Arkhangelskiy became the second Bahraini to narrowly miss out on a medal at Tokyo Aquatics Centre this week, joining teammate Stepan Goncharov as top-four finishers in their respective events.
Goncharov was also four-tenths of a second shy from securing Bahrain’s first-ever Asian Games medal in swimming after just missing out on the podium – while clocking a new national record – in the men’s 50m backstroke final on Monday.
Yesterday, Arkhangelskiy had a tremendous start in the final and was in the lead at the midway point, when he touched the wall in 23.66 seconds. But the race’s medallists eventually made up the gap and narrowly beat him to the finish.
Arkhangelskiy came home in 51.74s, not far behind gold-medallist Shoon Mitsunaga of Japan, who won in an Asiad record of 50.56s. Fang Xu from China took silver in 50.73s, while Katsuhiro Matsumoto made it two Japanese swimmers on the podium with bronze in 51.36s – just 0.38s ahead of Arkhangelskiy.
Earlier yesterday, Arkhangelskiy qualified for the final after clocking the sixth-fastest time from 31 competitors across four heats in the first round.
Meanwhile, Bahrain had another reason to be proud yesterday after the team of Paris 2024 Olympian Amani Al Obaidli, Abdulla Jamal, Ahmed Helal, and Asma Le Falher registered a new national record in the mixed 4x100m medley relay.
The quartet were competing in the first of two heats, which they finished in four minutes 09.54 seconds – the new all-time best for the kingdom in the event. Their time was 10th overall from 13 teams, narrowly missing out on the eight places in the medal race.
Al Obaidli was first in the water for the backstroke leg, which she completed in 1:06.85. Jamal followed with the breaststroke in 1:05.50, and then Helal completed his butterfly leg in 57.36s. Le Falher was Bahrain’s anchor in the freestyle leg, which she finished in 59.83s.
In attendance at Tokyo Aquatics Centre yesterday in support of the kingdom’s participants were Bahrain Aquatics president Abdulla Attiya, Bahrain Aquatics national teams committee head Farhan Saleh, and other delegation officials.
Bahrain’s swimmers are back in the water today on the fifth and penultimate day of action in the pool.
patrick@gdnmedia.bh