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18-Yr-Old Pan Zhanle’s 1:44.65 Puts Sun Yang’s 200 Free Chinese Record On Notice

2023 CHINESE NATIONALS

Just three days after ripping a new Chinese national and Asian continental record in the men’s 100m free, 18-year-old Pan Zhanle came close to producing a new record in the 200m free.

Competing on day four of the 2023 Chinese Nationals, Pan produced a time of 1:44.65 to take the men’s 2free. Behind him was Wang Shun who touched in 1:45.71 while Hong Jinquan rounded out the top 3 in 1:46.67.

The Chinese national record stands at the 1:44.39 Sun Yang put on the books in 2017 so Pan’s effort this evening fell just.26 off of that mark to become the nation’s just 2nd man ever to delve under the 1:45 barrier.

Top 5 Chinese Men’s LCM 200 Freestyle Performers

  1. Sun Yang – 1:44.39, 2017
  2. Pan Zhanle – 1:44.65, 2023
  3. Ji Xinjie – 1:45.48, 2019
  4. Zhang Lin – 1:45.83, 2019
  5. Wang Shun – 1:46.14, 2011

Splits for Pan’s time include 24.56/26.73 (51.29)/27.30/26.06 to get the job done, ranking as the #1 swimmer in the world now on the season. The teen takes over the crown from another Asian teen, South Korea’s Hwang Sunwoo who previously led the world with his 1:44.67 from October.

2022-2023 LCM Men 200 Free

MatthewGBR
Richards
07/25
1:44.30
2Thomas
Dean
GBR1:44.3207/25
3Sunwoo
Hwang
KOR1:44.4107/25
4Pan
Zhanle
CHN1:44.6505/04
5David
Popovici
ROU1:44.7007/24
View Top 26»

Engering these national championships, according to the World Aquatics database, Pan’s personal best rested at the 1:48.53 produced two years ago. Earlier in this meet Pan posted a split of 1:46.86 on his squad’s men’s 4x200m free relay. That already gave some leverage to the idea the Chinese men were getting their groove back in that relay event. But now, with his 1:44.65, things are taken up yet another notch.

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Emily Se-Bom Lee
1 year ago

Ye Shiwen went 2:22.44 in the 200 breast

MIMI
1 year ago

Australian coach Dennis has gone to China. He is now in charge of Pan and Fei these zhejiang swimmers.I think his joining will be helpful to these zhejiang swimmers, just as he helped Sun Yang at that time.Most of the records were set by zhejiang swimmers.By the way, Pan’s Chinese coach is also in charge of Sun Yang with Dennis from 2014 to 2018

Robbos
1 year ago

Just shows how good Thorpe was swimming these times & better more than 20 years ago.

Paul
1 year ago

He was born in the Popovici era. Not lucky.

oxyswim
1 year ago

Love that we have a new collection of guys who are elite in the 100 & 200 ala Van Den Hoogenband. There was a long stretch where the 100 had shifted towards pure power/speed athletes (Cielo, Sullivan, Bernard, Dressel) now we’re back in a middle ground. McEvoy and Chalmers could dabble in the 200 when they were at the peak of their powers in the 100, but never raced it seriously intentionally, now we have Popovici, Pan Zhanle, Hwang Sunwoo, Matt Richards, with a few others right on the edge of that conversation.

Luigi
1 year ago

Is Sun Yang’s just the Chinese record or also the Asian record?

bubo
1 year ago

The young guys have to go sub-1:45 because the older generation wasn’t able to do so as a collective for almost a decade.

Nuff
1 year ago

Pan is the 10th swimmer under 1.45 in the last two years. Six of them were born in years beginning with a 2.

Gotta love this 200 free revival after years of relative drought

Rafael
Reply to  Nuff
1 year ago

And even the ones born before 2000 are no older than from 1997…

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Braden Keith

Braden Keith is the Editor-in-Chief and a co-founder/co-owner of SwimSwam.com. He first got his feet wet by building The Swimmers' Circle beginning in January 2010, and now comes to SwimSwam to use that experience and help build a new leader in the sport of swimming. Aside from his life on the InterWet, …

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