Wellbrock Clocks German, Romanchuk Hits Ukrainian 800 Free National Records

2022 FINA WORLD AQUATICS CHAMPIONSHIPS

• June 18-25, 2022 (pool swimming)
• Budapest, Hungary
• Duna Arena
• LCM (50-meter format)
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The men’s 800m freestyle started this day four finals session off right, with the top 3 finishers all producing national records en route to landing on the podium.

Taking the title was Olympic champion Bobby Finke, hitting a huge lifetime best of 7:39.36 while runners-up Florian Wellbrock of Germany and Mykailo Romanchuk of Ukraine earned times of 7:39.63 and 7:40.05 for silver and bronze, respectively.

MEN’S 800 FREESTYLE – FINAL

• World Record: 7:32.12, Lin Zhang (CHN), 2009
• Championships Record: 7:32.12, Lin Zhang (CHN), 2009
• 2021 Olympic Champion: Bobby Finke (USA) – 7:41.87
• 2019 World Champion: Gregorio Paltrinieri (ITA) – 7:39.27

1. Bobby Finke (USA), 7:39.36 AR
2. Florian Wellbrock (GER), 7:39.63
3. Mykhailo Romanchuk (UKR), 7:40.05
4. Gregorio Paltrinieri (ITA), 7:41.19
5. Guilherme Costa (BRA), 7:45.48
6. Gabriele Detti (ITA), 7:47.75
7. Damien Joly (FRA), 7:48.10
8. Daniel Wiffen (IRL), 7:50.63

For Wellbrock, the two-time Olympic medaslist entered this meet with a career-quickest mark of 7:41.77, a time he produced in the heats of the event at the 2020 Olympic Games. There in Tokyo, the 24-year-old ultimately placed 4th in 7:42.68.

As such, here in Budapest, the open water and pool swimming ace managed to get under the 7:40 threshold for the very first time, partially fueld by having Finke breathing down his neck with a blazing last 50m of 25.93.

Romanchuk previously held his nation’s record with the 7:41.28 notched in the 8free prelims in Tokyo before capturing bronze in the final in a bronze medal-worthy 7:42.33. For this 25-year-old, he shaved over a second off of that previous PB en route to repeating his 3rd place finish from last summer.

Finke’s winning mark now ranks him as the 7th fastest performer in history, while Wellbrock and Romanchuk slide into the all-time top performers in slots #8 and #9.

Splits for the top 3 finishers are below:

Of note, these 2022 World Championships represent the first time since 2015 that an Italian has not arrived on the 800m free podium, with Gregorio Paltrinieri snagging silver in 2015, Gabriele Detti producing gold in 2017 and Paltrinieri back on the podium with gold in 2019.

Paltrinieri’s 7:39.27 from the 2019 World Championships remains as the European Record but Wellbrock is well within striking distance now that he’s entered 7:39 territory.