Leon Marchand On His 200 Free At French Championships: “I Wanted To Win This Race”

2023 FRENCH ELITE CHAMPIONSHIPS

• Sunday, June 11th – Friday, June 16th
• Rennes, France
• LCM (50m)
• World Championships Qualifier
• FFN Selection Criteria
• Meet Central
• Entries
• SwimSwam Preview
• Day 1 Prelims Recap / Day 1 Finals Recap
• Day 2 Prelims Recap/Day 2 Finals Recap
• Live Results
• Live Stream

Day two of the 2023 French Elite Championships brought its share of high-octane racing with the likes of Leon Marchand, Anastasia Kirpichnikova and Mewen Tomac in the Rennes water.

Refresh yourself on the action with our links above and then hear what several of tonight’s medalists had to say after qualifying for next month’s World Championships.

Pauline Mahieu – women’s 100m back gold medalist

“I am really relieved and happy. I loved this race. I’m not lying to you, there was crazy pressure because it was the place that counted above all. I’m so happy to have won. My strategy was not to look at others. I know they tend to go fast and if I start staring I tend to think. I work on that in training. I know I have a big comeback and that’s what I managed to put in place again today. To compete in this event as an individual at the Worlds is incredible. I’ve been dreaming about this for years and it’s finally here.”

Analia Pigree – women’s 100m back silver medalist

“I had a pretty good race. Swimming in 59 seconds, I did not expect it. I was aiming for the qualifying time of 1’00″29, so it’s still not bad and I’m very happy with my race. Doing a good race like that feels good, especially with everything that happened in the past, the injury, etc. My form is coming back really well, I’m learning to swim the 100m backstroke again, I’m learning to love the 100m backstroke again and it’s great.”

Mewen Tomac – men’s 100m back gold medalist

“I’m very happy because throughout the year I struggle to find my stroke in the 100m backstroke. Today I found it right away and I’m happy. I worked a lot on the start this year because it was on this part that I was losing time compared to the others. It’s the second time I’ve swum under 53”. It’s cool to come back to that level. I will work even more to hope to go faster.”

Yohann Ndoye-Brouard – men’s 100m back silver medalist

“There is relief and I am very happy. I don’t think I have often swum faster than 53.4. It’s a good time, I’m happy because I think I can do better at the world championships. I’m having a little trouble concentrating on my race so I tried not to look at Mewen and focus on myself. I had to redo a whole mental scheme because after an injury there is necessarily a drop in confidence. It was a race against time, it was hard to manage sometimes, between the intensity that I wanted to put in training and the intensity that my body could endure. There are five weeks left and I think still be able to do some work.”

Leon Marchand – men’s 200m free gold medalist

“It was nice. I wanted to win this race. The standard was quite high and my best time was 1’48”70 so I didn’t have too many expectations. I built my race better than in the heats. I put less legs in the first 100m, which allowed me to finish well. I think I swam at my level but I had never really had the opportunity to swim this event. I had already been very quick in short course in the United States. It’s difficult to translate that in the long course, it’s not an easy race but it’s a good start. We’ll have to swim faster. I think we manage to build a nice 4×200 m relay. We can aim for a podium this summer and we will all have to be at our best level.”

Anastasia Kirpichnikova – women’s 1500m free gold medalist

“This competition is tough because it’s been a long time since I swam at a competition like this. But that’s life! For me, it’s hard to swim alone, because I’ve been swimming alone for two years and I hope it will be more interesting in the big championships. I still have the 800m and maybe even the 200m.”

Quotes courtesy of FFN.