2018 LEN EUROPEAN AQUATICS CHAMPIONSHIPS
- August 3-9, 2018 (swimming portion)
- Glasgow, Scotland
- Tollcross International Swimming Centre
- Psych Sheet
Europe has long been the center of event innovation in swimming. They raced mixed relays long before FINA acknowledged World Records in them in 2013, and now the European federation LEN is pushing the event envelope once again: with a mixed 800 free relay.
14 nations have entered the events, without seed times: because it’s not clear that this race has ever been held before in any official capacity.
Pegging this race will be a total crapshoot, mostly because we don’t know who’s going to swim it. If names like Katinka Hosszu and Sarah Sjostrom join in on the fun, it becomes a premier race. If they don’t, then the medals will go to whichever nations come closest to their premiere swimmers entering.
Of all the teams, the one most damaged by non-entries is Russia, who would be gold-medal contenders, if not favorites, if it weren’t for the absence of their top male and female 200 freestylers Aleksandr Krasnykh and Veronika Andrusenko. Italy is not far behind – they could really use Mitch D’Arrigo for this relay, but of course he’s not longer competing for Italy.
There’s also two swimmers, Federica Pellegrini and Sarah Sjostrom, who have sworn off the 200 free forever – but who might relent in hopes of a relay medal.
Picks below are based on ‘best possible relays.’
Teams Entered in the Mixed 800 Free Relay:
- Belgium
- Estonia
- Great Britain
- Germany
- Hungary
- Israel
- Italy
- Netherlands
- Poland
- Russia
- San Marino
- Slovakia
- Sweden
- Turkey
Predicted Finish
Aggregate times based on 2017-2018 bests, of swimmers otherwise entered in the meet:
- Hungary (Hosszu, Kesely, Kozma, Nemeth) – Aggregate: 7:25.41
- Great Britain (Faulkner, Greenslade, Scott, Guy) – Aggregate: 7:25.37
- Germany (Gose, Kohler, Zellmann, Heintz) – Aggregate: 7:32.92
- Netherlands (Heemskerk, Neumann, Stolk, Weertman) – Aggregate: 7:30.55
- Italy (Pellegrini, Pirozzi, Megli, Dotto) – Aggregate: 7:28.74
- Russia (Andreeva, Guzehnkova, Krasnykh, Girev) – Aggregate: 7:27.73
- Sweden (Sjostrom, Hansson, Johansson, Hanson) – Aggregate: 7:33.27
- Belgium (Dumont, Goris, Croenen, Weiremans) – Aggregate: 7:35.30
I think they should add like 20 more events.
a 4×400 free relay
a 4x 800 free relay
a 4x 1500 free relay
Then mixed events for the 3 relays above.
Then 4×200 medley relay
Then 4x 200 mixed medley relay.
Then 400 meters backstroke, breaststroke and butterfly.
Then 800 meters individual medley.
Then an individual medley relay where one swimmer swims all four strokes and the next swimmer coming in also swims all four strokes in the same order.
Let’s say the 4×200 and 4×400 individual medley relay and then mixed events for both relays.
Olympics can be extended by one month.
It,ll be fun.
Then more track and field events
Dreaming about 4×200 fly…
Announcement of an open competition for the glory.
I’m pleased to invite you to take part in a “swimming” race about the Europeans in Glasgow.
If you’re interested in the possibility you have to collect and name 10 swimmers for your team.
Only individual finals in the pool will count, with 12-10-8-6-5-4-3-2 points from 1st to 8th.
WR is 20, ER is 10 points in addition, but of course only one of them. No other records will get points.
In case of a tie every swimmer will get whole points for her/his place and one (two?, remember Le Clos, Cseh, MP) place/places behind her/him will be dropped out.
In case of setting the actual WR… Read more »
IF they are going to add relays I’d prefer men’s and women’s 4×200 medleys. I know the mixed relays are popular with the smaller federations but I still find them gimmicky.
I’d love an 8x50m mixed medley relay. Sure, the second backstrokes would dive in, but I think it would be amazingly fun to watch, and some strategy as to whether to swim men or women first.
Here’s the best argument against a mixed 800 free relay.
The races are boring. Snooze fest.
3/4 races (on the men’s side) are lopsided victories. Here are the margins of victory in the major meet of the year (Oly, WC and PanPacs). I didn’t look up Euros. Sorry Euros.
Starting in 2000 olympics and going to last years worlds
5.50 (2000)
6.20
2.81
1.18
0.13 (2004)
3.15
7.11
6.81
5.14 (2008)
0.60
7.17
2.14
3.07 (2012)
2.20
0.13
0.42
2.47 (2016)
0.98
Now, 3 out of the last four years it has been a good race. Take out… Read more »
Forget this. Let’s go with 200 relays. Medley and Free
I’m tempted to agree – I want more inclusion of the 50m stroke swimmers – add 4×50 medley and 4×50 free + 50fl/bk/br. I care way more about that than watching mixed gender relays.
Just making events up …. love it
Makes swimming more interesting
All events are made up
If, and it’s a big if, GBR swim Anderson – We should win. Her 1.56 at Euro Jnrs would carve out the difference.
Hungary will win.
With or without Hosszu, or Kozma we will win.
Don’t think so mate Scott and Guy in a home pool will at least be going 1:44 lows
agreed , those 2 guys can make the whole difference …..
Yes, they will be faster, but our girls will be too and Katinka is a beast as the anchor.
Kozma and Nemeth 1:45, Kesely 1:56, Hosszu 1:55, somewhere about 7:22.
I think you do the GB women a bit of a disservice. Faulkner is, on paper, faster than any of the Hungarian women this year (1.56.7 pb), Anderson swum 1.56 a few weeks ago anchoring a relay and O’Connor is 1.57 flat everytime. Hosszu’s form is a bit of an unknown.
For me, Hungary need to overperform to match Britain in that race.
I only wrote the best possibilities for us. And I always try not to offend any nation’s athletes. But my Hungarian is much better THAN my English 🙂
Im waiting for the day where Siobhan can go her 1:55.82 again for her 200 free, it’ll help the GB team a lot for the relays with Ellie Faulkner and Freya Anderson, with 1:56’s in them, who would be the fourth? Willmott? Miley? Coates? Wood? Obviously this is just hypothetical and probably won’t happen, but im eager for it to!
According to her instagram page, Ajna won’t swim this event, without her and Katinka, the chances are very slight. What is more sad, Ajna won’t swim the 200 feee individually either.