European Championships, Day Five Finals: David Popovici Completes Three-Peat For Treble Double
David Popovici wrote another line in history when he completed the 200 free three-peat and the treble double in Paris.
The Romanian won the 100/200 free double at Roma 2022 and Belgrade 2024 and he made it three straight 100 free titles in the French capital earlier in the week. The Olympic champion returned to the Olympic Aquatic Centre for the 200 free final where he came home to wrap up the treble double.
Evgeniia Chikunova came past Angharad Evans on the final 50 to take the 200m breaststroke title; Simona Quadarella made it four 1500 titles and Miroslav Knedla of Czechia took the men’s 50 back title in a blanket finish where 0.04 separated the first four men home.
Marrit Steenbergen made more history with a 50.74 split on the anchor leg to steer the Netherlands quartet to silver behind a Neutral Athletes B quartet. It was the fastest split by a woman, swifter than her previous record of 50.87.
Ahead of the action, there was a standing ovation for Laure Manaudou with the crowd rising as one to cheer the retired Olympic, world and European champion.
Women’s 100m Butterfly
Roos Vanotterdijk defended the title she won two years in Belgrade with a gun to tape victory.
The Belgian was a sliver inside European record pace at halfway in 25.97 before coming home to touch in 56.08 as she added 100 gold to her 50 fly silver behind the great Sarah Sjostrom.
Angelina Kohler, the 2024 world champion, was second in 56.39 with Neutral Athlete Daria Klepikova third in 56.76.
Men’s 200 Freestyle
For the third time in his still developing career, David Popovici has completed the 100/200 freestyle double at the European Championships. The Romanian took care of the longer distance on Friday night in Paris, leading wire-to-wire for victory in 1:44.15. Popovici was never threatened en route to capping the same feat he managed at the 2022 and 2024 editions.
Coming off the No. 3 performance in history in the 100 freestyle, Popovici didn’t record one of his best times in the 200 freestyle, but he was plenty strong enough to defeat Lithuania’s Tomas Navikonis (1:44.55) and Great Britain’s James Guy (1:44.87), who were the silver and bronze medallists and produced personal-best times.
Popovici took the lead off the start, splitting 24.01 for the opening 50 metres and going through the midway point of the race in 50.53. Given his finishing history, Popovici was perfectly positioned at that stage and he closed out his latest gold with a 1:17.36 split at the 150 and a homecoming length of 26.79. Navikonis actually out-split Popovici on the final lap, behind a split of 26.37, but his early deficit left too much room to overcome.
Guy’s bronze medal matched the third-place finish he recorded at the 2016 European Championships, that timespan exhibiting Guy’s staying power in the sport. More impressive is the fact that he set a personal best, lowering his previous top time of 1:45.04. For Guy to join the sub-1:45 club at 30 years old is a tribute to his longevity.
It followed his joint silver medal with Matt Richards at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow last month where they represented England and Wales as an outside smoker by Kai Taylor left both men feeling it was an opportunity missed.
“I’m really happy with that.” said Guy, who is coached by Ryan Livingstone at Manchester Performance Centre. “I think coming into the meet, it was just like, what did you do wrong at Commonwealths? Like, what can you change and what can you fix into there? It’s very rare you get to go again after a major into another major. And being in peak condition. So it was just kind of changing tactically what I could have done better in Commies, and it worked really well. And yeah, personal best time as well, which is great.”
Popovici’s textile world record stands at 1:42.97 from the 2022 edition in Rome and he’s subsequently gone 1:43 on four further occasions. Not that he was pulling away from the field on that final 50.
“I looked over and I was like, he isn’t actually going anywhere until the last like 15, 20 metres,” said Guy, the 2015 world champion. “It’s just where I am right now, the training we’re doing, the model that we have, I think it’s only going to go up from here. And it’s a great sign because I know what we’ve done in the training pool, I know what we can do to get faster.”
It’s a positive marker with two years to go before the LA Olympics in 2028. “And the thing is, you don’t want to be going too quick too early. At the end of the day, it’s the Olympic year that matters. That’s when you want to be firing on all cylinders. There’s no point going crazy fast times now and then not doing it when it matters the most. But yeah, that’s the plan. It’s always, trying to build into this, into the cycle. But if you go best times now in this condition on the second meet, you know, maybe if you could have done a third, might have gone even faster. So yeah, it’s a really exciting time. I’m just swimming free. I know I’m in good shape.”
Women’s 200m Breaststroke
Evgeniia Chikunova came through on the final 50 to clinch the title and thwart Angharad Evans’ bid for the 100/200 double.
Evans went through 100 in 1:06.54 – well inside Chikunova’s WR pace – but the Neutral Athlete bided her time, acting as the hound to Evans’ hare. She came past the Briton in 2:19.32, 0.54 inside the championship record of 2:19.84 held by Dane Rikke Moller Pedersen since Berlin 2014.
Evans was second in 2:21.21 to become the fourth British woman to win silver in this event and the first since Molly Renshaw at Berlin 2014. Evans has now won three golds and a silver across the Commonwealth Games and European Championships in what has been a real breakthrough season for the Scot.
Mona McSharry of Ireland clinched her second medal of the week in 2:22.43 to add to her 100 silver.
Evans, coached by Ben Higson at the University of Stirling, said: If I’m going to come second, it’s going to be to the world record holder, and the 200 is still a new event to me. I hesitate saying that because, you know, I’ve had massive drops in that event, but I’m not as experienced in it as I am the 100, and I’m still learning how to swim it.
“And I swam it very bravely tonight. I absolutely went for it, and I know that a lot of the other girls can come back fast, and I just left everything on the table tonight. And it’s my last individual swim of the year, and I had absolutely nothing to lose. I’ve already earned myself the title of European champion, which is such an honour, and I just went into tonight to just give it my all and leave everything in the pool.
“And I said to Ben (Higson) before, there’s no losing tonight. Either I gain more experience or I gain a medal and I ended up gaining both. So it was probably the most painful race I’ve done. Going out in 1:06.5 isn’t easy at all, but, the brave are usually favoured.”
McSharry has had a fine career in recent years after some turbulence which led the Irishwoman to question her future in the sport. A bronze medal in the 100 breast a few kms across the city in the glorious summer nights of 2024 led to a rekindling of her love for swimming. She resolved to continue and she followed 100 silver behind Evans with bronze on Friday leading her to joke that she should simply move to Paris.
“I think Paris is a good city for me, I might just move here,” she said. “I think it feels almost different because we’re not in the same pool or accommodation, but it does have the same kind of feel to it and I do remember back to Paris and having my family here to support really made it feel a lot similar, it’s been great.”
Men’s 50m Backstroke
Just 0.03 separated the first three men home spearheaded by Miroslav Knedla of Czechia who won the title by 0.01 in 24.11.
World record-holder Kliment Kolesnikov was second in 24.12, 0.02 ahead of fellow Neutral Athlete Pavel Samusenko (24.14).
Knedla claimed world and European junior crowns but his title tonight was his first in the senior long-course pool. Apostolos Christou of Greece was locked out of the podium by 0.01 in 24.15 as he was thwarted in his three-peat bid.
Women’s 1500m Freestyle
Simona Quadarella won her fourth title in the longest race in the pool with a dominant performance in championship record time.
The Italian was only narrowly ahead of Isabel Gose at halfway with the pair pretty much stroke for stroke and eyeball for eyeball.
Quadarella though accelerated and put almost a body length between the two of them and was never threatened thereafter to come home in 15:46.22, exactly four seconds inside Boglarka Kapas’ CR that had stood for 10 years since London 2016.
Gose won silver in 15:49.31 with Maya Werner making it a German 2-3 punch in 15:52.50.
Mixed 4x100m Freestyle
A 50.74 anchor leg by Marrit Steenbergen – the fastest ever by a woman – wasn’t enough for gold as the Netherlands fell just short of the Neutral Athletes B squad.
The NAB led throughout with Egor Kornev leading off in 47.05 followed by Ivan Girev (47.67) and Daria Klepikova who split 52.21 before handing over to Kira Manokhina with a 2.42secs advantage over the Dutch.
Steenbergen took over with the Dutch in fourth but she picked off the teams ahead of her before appearing on the brink of going ahead of Manokhina. The NAB woman dug deep though and just got her hand to the wall first in 3:19.95 to 3:20.09.
It was a championship standard, slicing 2.12secs from the 3:22.07 mark held by France since Glasgow 2018.
Italy – featuring a 51.79 split by Sara Curtis – were third in 3:20.80.
Steenbergen split 24.11/26.63 en-route to the fastest split by a woman in history, surpassing her 50.87 blast in the mixed medley relay.
France were DQd because of a false start by Maxime Grousset on leadoff which left the raucous crowd a little deflated.
