Syo Sotodate and Kazuya Kaneda dominate preliminary rounds of Men’s events in Japan Open 2011
Syo Sotodate and Kazuya Kaneda presented beautiful swims on day one of the 2011 Japan Open Swimming National Championships, dominating the qualifying rounds of Men’s events.
The session concluded after the preliminary rounds of the 200m freestyle, 200m butterfly, 100m breast-stroke and the 100m back-stroke in the Men’s category.
The first event of the session was the Men’s 200m butterfly, where the 23-year-old Kazuya appeared as the top qualifying swimmer into the finals, clocking a time of 1:57.95 minutes. Kaneda remained 4.98 seconds sluggish from the national record of 1:52.97
minutes and was followed by Takuya Nozawa, who secured the second fastest qualification spot, posting a time of 1:58.30 minutes. The 26-year-old Hidemasa Sano followed them into the finals by securing third fastest qualification spot, with a timing of 1:58.38
minutes.
In the 200m freestyle heats, Sotodate qualified for the finals by occupying the top qualification spot in 1:48.36 minutes. Sotodate was 0.25 seconds faster than his following swimmer, Syogo Hihara, who touched the wall for the second fastest qualification
by clocking a time of 1:48.61 minutes. They were followed by Fumiya Hidaka, who emerged as the third fastest swimmer in a time of 1:49.00 minutes.
The third event of the session was the 100m back-stroke, where Ryosuke Irie transpired as the fastest swimmer into the finals, posting a time of 54.91 seconds. The 20-year-old Irie amazed the arena with his astonishing performance, as he was only 2.67 seconds
away from the national record of 52.24 seconds.
Moments later, the arena witnessed the superb effort of 21-year-old Ryo Tateishi, who defeated Olympics champion, Kosuke Kitajima by clocking a time of 1:00.92 minutes. Kitajima, who is the national record holder, qualified as the second fastest swimmer
into the finals with a timing of 1:01.71 minutes. Naoya Tomita followed them into the finals, qualifying as the third fastest swimmer in a time of 1:01.92 minutes.
These swimmers will once again compete with each other in the finals of their respective winners, where the winners will be provided with a chance to represent their country at the 2011 World Championships in Shanghai, this July.
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