Matt Richards made history in more ways than one during his 200-meter freestyle victory at the British Championships on Sunday.
Not only did the 20-year-old lower another one of his own Welsh records by nearly a second with a winning time of 1:44.83, but he also became the first swimmer ever to go sub-22 in the 50 free (21.98 for third place), sub-48 in the 100 free (47.72 in prelims), and sub-1:45 in the 200 free.
Richards accomplished the feat all in the past three days, as his previous bests entering this meet stood at 22.38, 48.23, and 1:45.77. Dutch legend Pieter Van Den Hoogenband nearly hit those benchmarks with best times of 22.03, 47.68, and 1:44.89 from 2000-08. Romanian phenom David Popovici might soon join Richards in unchartered territory as he already owns the 100 free world record (46.86) and 200 free world junior record (1:42.97), just needing to lower his best 50 free time of 22.16 from last summer’s European Junior Championships.
Richards now ranks as the top performer in the world so far this year, a tenth of a second ahead of runner-up finisher Tom Dean (1:44.93), the reigning Olympic champion, who led for almost the entire race. Both Richards and Dean reached the wall under the auto-qualifying cut of 1:45.01. Dean has been as fast as 1:44.22 before and took bronze at Worlds in 2022 with a 1:44.98.
“I’m really happy with that,” Richards said after the win. “There are still lots of things to move on and improve on, I probably didn’t push it on enough in that middle 100m. The plan was to race the race at the end of the day, there was probably a slightly faster time than that, I felt I had a bit more in the tank at the end which is promising for the summer.
“But I’m pretty sure that’s world number one and two, I don’t think we’ve had that since Tokyo when Duncan and Deano were one and two, so that’s very promising for the summer and hopefully we can move it on there,” he added. “There’s lots of big fish in the sea in these events nowadays. There are guys out there going really quick, young guys, old guys, it doesn’t matter anymore. This is a great place to try new things and learn stuff to take into the summer. That’s the plan now, full steam ahead, back in training and get on ready for a big summer.”
MEN’S 200 FREESTYLE
- British Record: 1:44.22 – Tom Dean (2021)
- World Championships Qualification Standard: 1:45.01
- Matt Richards – 1:44.83
- Tom Dean – 1:44.93
- James Guy – 1:45.85
The race for third was contentious as well as James Guy and Duncan Scott battled it out. Guy ultimately touched with a 1:45.85 for the bronze medal, 0.05 seconds ahead of Olympic silver medalist in the event Duncan Scott. The aggregate time of the top four men was a 7:01.51, getting them well under the consideration cut for the 4×200 freestyle relay this summer.
These four men won Olympic gold in the 4×200 freestyle at Tokyo 2020 and will be in contention for another medal this summer at Fukuoka 2023.
“That was a world-class final. Two boys doing 1:44s, we haven’t had that since Olympic trials in 2021 when Duncan and I did it and then we went on to win the 4x200m Free at the Olympic Games with Matt, Jimmy, Duncan and Jarv [Calum Jarvis],” Dean said.
“It just bodes really well for that men’s 4x200m free in the summer again — the one last year was good, but we know we can do better,” Dean added. “I feel like the 4x100m free is following the same path the 4x200m has, and hopefully we can go to Japan and be world champions.”
