The ninth edition of the World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships kicks off in two weeks with over 600 athletes from 100 different countries expected to descend on the Mediterranean resort city of Netanya, Israel.
The six-day championships will run from the 4th - 9th September with qualification open to both male and female athletes aged 14 to 18 years as of the 31st December this year. This equalisation across the genders is a slight variation to previous championships that were open to female swimmers aged 14-17 years and male swimmers aged 15-18 years.
In anticipation of this year’s ninth edition of the championships, we take a look back at the record breakers and best performers at the eighth edition of the World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships in Lima, Peru, in 2022.
Record Breakers | 8th World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships (2022)
The eighth World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships in Lima last year delivered new Championship Records in nine individual events. Headlining the meet was the newly anointed World Record holder in the Men’s 100m Freestyle, David Popovici. The Romanian had posted the new World Record at the European Championships just two weeks earlier, and carried that form into Peru with a 47.07 lead leg in the final of the 4 x 100m Freestyle Relay - a new Championship Record and a swim just 0.21 seconds shy of his world-leading mark.
Popovici also delivered a new Championship Record in the 200m Freestyle, although his 1:46.18 was more than three seconds off his World Junior Record also set at the European Championships earlier that month.
Poland’s Ksawery Masiuk also delivered two new Championship Records in Lima, his 24.44 in the 50m Backstroke final and 52.91 in the 100m Backstroke final delivering the then 17 year-old with two new records to accompany his gold medals. It was the second time in Lima that both the 50m Backstroke and 100m Backstroke records had been broken with South Africa’s Pieter Coetze breaking both Championship Records in the semi finals.
His records lasted all of 24 hours before Masiuk erased the South African from the record books. Coetze did manage to keep his name on at least one record from his time in Peru, his gold medal winning swim in the 200m Backstroke in a 1:56.05 lowering Hugo Gonzalez’s Championship Record set back in 2017.
The final Championship Record set in the male events in Lima was the remarkable 50m Butterfly swim by Portugal’s Diogo Matos Ribeiro. His 22.96 in the final lowered his own mark of 23.12 set in the heats, with the time also a new World Junior Record as he became the first junior to swim ‘sub 23’.
On the female side of the schedule it was Japan’s Mio Narita that recorded the only female Championship Record of the week, her 4:37.78 in the 400m Individual Medley breaking Alba Vazquez Ruiz’s previous mark set in 2019.
Race to the Top | 8th World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships (2022)
With 42 events on the program in Peru, it was the Japanese team that finished the eighth edition of the championships on top of the medal tally with the leaderboard shifting dramatically on the final night of competition. With the individual events all wrapped up, it was Hungary sitting atop of the medal tally as the standalone team with seven gold medals from the six days of racing.
In the penultimate relay of the championships, it was the Polish boys Ksawery Masiuk, Filip Urbanski, Michal Chmielewski, and Krzysztof Matuszewski, that powered home in the Male 4 x 100m Medley Relay to join Hungary at the top of the leaderboard - albeit with less silver medals than the Hungarians.
However the final script still hadn’t been written, as in the last event of the meet, the Female 4 x 100m Medley Relay of Yuzuki Mizuno, Yumeno Kusuda, Mizuki Hirai, and Mio Narita, from ‘Team Japan’, held off Italy and Poland to claim their nation’s seventh and final gold medal of the meet to rocket them to the top of the medal tally.
Medal Tally | 8th World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships (2022)
1 Japan 7 Gold, 8 Silver, 4 Bronze
2 Hungary 7 Gold, 7 Silver, 0 Bronze
3 Poland 7 Gold, 1 Silver, 6 Bronze
4 Romania 4 Gold, 2 Silver, 2 Bronze
5 Turkey 4 Gold, 2 Silver, 2 Bronze
6 Spain 3 Gold, 1 Silver, 2 Bronze
7 Portugal 3 Gold, 0 Silver, 0 Bronze
8 Italy 2 Gold, 8 Silver, 10 Bronze
9 Brazil 1 Gold, 3 Silver, 1 Bronze
10 South Africa 1 Gold, 3 Silver, 1 Bronze
Best Performers - Individual Events | 8th World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships (2022)
3 Gold: Merve Tuncel, Turkey
3 Gold: Diogo Matos Ribeiro, Portugal
2 Gold: David Popovici, Romania
2 Gold: Carlos Garach, Spain
2 Gold: Ksawery Masiuk, Poland
2 Gold: Nikolett Pádár, Hungary
2 Gold: Karolina Piechowicz, Poland
2 Gold: Mio Narita, Japan
Championship Records | 8th World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships (2022)
Male 100m Freestyle: David Popovici, Romania (Heats 4 x 100m Free Relay & Final 4 x 100m Free Relay)
Male 200m Freestyle: David Popovici, Romania (Final)
Male 50m Backstroke: Pieter Coetze, South Africa (Semi Final)
Male 50m Backstroke: Ksawery Masiuk, Poland (Final)
Male 100m Backstroke: Pieter Coetze, South Africa (Semi Final)
Male 100m Backstroke: Ksawery Masiuk, Poland (Final)
Male 200m Backstroke: Pieter Coetze, South Africa (Final)
Male 50m Butterfly: Diogo Matos Ribeiro, Portugal (Heats & Final)
Female 400m IM: Mio Narita, Japan (Final)
World Junior Records | 8th World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships (2022)
Male 50m Butterfly: Diogo Matos Ribeiro, Portugal (Final)
The ninth edition of the World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships runs from the 4-9 September 2023. Stay tuned to www.worldaquatics.com, or follow @world_aquatics on Instagram, to keep up with all the results from Netanya, Israel.