2021 LEN EUROPEAN AQUATICS CHAMPIONSHIPS

• Swimming: Monday, May 17th – Sunday, May 23rd, 2021
• Budapest, Hungary
• Prelims at 10:00 am local/Finals at 6:00 pm local
• Event Site
• Entry List
• Live Results
• Live Stream

The third day of swimming events at the 2021 European Championships saw another opportunity for teams to compete for one of the four Wildcard relay spots for this summer’s Tokyo Olympics. Yesterday featured the mixed 800 free relay, an event that we will not see in Tokyo. Today’s opportunity came in the men’s 800 freestyle relay.

As a reminder, the top 12 teams from prelims at the 2019 FINA World Championships have already automatically qualified for Tokyo. There are four “Wildcard” spots left for the four fastest teams during the qualification period which runs through May 31, 2021. Teams can decline an invite, leaving a spot for the next fastest team.

Editor’s note: FINA doesn’t officially publish an up-to-date ranking for relay qualifying, so we’ve done our best to compile the current rankings manually.

Heading into the European Championships, Hungary held a firm advantage in the first Wildcard spot with a 3+ second advantage over South Korea. Belgian was sitting in third, less than a tenth ahead of New Zealand. The Irish were less than a second out of a Wildcard spot and Serbia and the Netherlands were among the countries lurking and looking to move up in the rankings.

Much like we saw on Monday with the women’s 400 free relay, an unranked team made a statement in prelims. The French men swam a 7:10.44 in prelims to jump all the way up to the second Wildcard spot. The Irish were able to drop over a second to move up one spot, bumping Belgium out of the last Wildcard spot. Spain, who like the French, were off the list coming into the meet, moved into the third “Out” position, giving them a chance to move up at finals. With France, Ireland, Belgium, and Spain all qualifying for finals, tonight’s race would have a lot on the line for teams looking to secure relay qualification for Tokyo.

Here is how the rankings stood after the preliminary session:

Finals saw the Russians set a new Championship Record in the 800 free relay with a time of 7:03.48. France would drop another 3+ seconds from prelims to finish fourth in 7:07.24.  The French moved up one spot to the top Wildcard spot, bumping Hungary down into second. Both the French and Hungarians showing good form this spring, they are both in a good position to qualify for finals in Tokyo.

The Irish would see a national record as Jack McMillan, Jordan Sloan, Finn McGeever, and Gerry Quinn placed fifth in 7:12.00. While the Irish did not move up in the rankings, they dropped their time by .73 seconds. Spain and Belgium were unable to improve upon their times to move up in the rankings.

Switzerland, who were disqualified in finals for an early exchange, have already qualified for Tokyo through their performance at the 2019 World Championships.

The full rankings for the men’s 800 free relay after today: