Ronan Wantenaar made history by becoming the first Namibian swimmer to reach the semifinals at the World Aquatics Swimming Championships in Budapest over the weekend.
Swimming in the men’s 50m breaststroke on Saturday, Wantenaar won his heat in 26,15 seconds, to finish 13th overall and qualify for the semifinals for the top 16 swimmers. In the process he also smashed his own Namibian Open record of 27,45 seconds by more than a second.
In his semifinal, Wantenaar got off to a great start and seemed to be heading for a new Namibian record, but was unfortunately disqualified due to a technicality, as team manager Agata Mason explained.
“In breaststroke, swimmers are allowed to do one fly kick during the underwater breakout, but Ronan put in two. It’s very unfortunate as it would have been another national record if it was not for that extra fly kick,” she said.
Wantenaar was the third fastest African, after two South African swimmers, Chris Smith and Michael Houlie reached the final where they came third and seventh respectively.
It was Wantenaar’s second national record at the World Championships after he had earlier finished 30th overall in the 100m breaststroke in 58,59 seconds which was nearly two seconds faster than his previous record of 1:00,35.
Wantenaar was the second fastest African, with SA’s Chris Smith coming 16th in the heats in 57,38.
Oliver Durand also excelled by breaking four Namibian records in the 200m and 400m individual medley events.
On Saturday, the 17-year-old Durand smashed his national Open record of 4:31,82 by nearly 15 seconds with a new time of 4:16,99. It was also more than 22 seconds faster than the previous 17-18 year age group record of 4:39,65.
That put him 33rd overall in the heats, and the second fastest African, behind Jaouad Syoud of Algeria, who was 22nd overall in a time of 4:11,71.
On Tuesday, Durand also set a new Open and 17-18 year age group record of 1:59,26 in the 200m individual medley. It was just over four seconds faster than Wantenaar’s previous Open record of 2:03,32 and more than eight seconds faster than Wantenaar’s former 17-18 year age group record of 2:08,04.
Durand’s time was the 32nd fastest during the heats, while he was the second fastest African, behind Syoud, who came 24th overall in the heats in 1:56,36.
Jessica Humphrey, who is only 16 years old, just missed out on setting new national records in the women’s 50m and 100m backstroke events.
On Thursday she came second in her heat in the 50m backstroke in 28,52 seconds, which was just outside her national and 15/16 year age group record of 28,50 that she set in September.
That put her 38th overall in the heats, and the second African behind Jessica Thompson of South Africa, who came 21st overall in 27,10.
On Tuesday, Humphrey just missed out on Zanre Oberholzer’s 100m backstroke Open and 15/16 year old record of 1:00,90 when she won her heat in 1:00,95. That was the 41st fastest time of the heats, while she was the second fastest African behind South Africa’s Milla Drakopoulos, who came 26th overall in 59,33.
Molina Smalley competed in the women’s 100m individual medley on Thursday where she set the 33rd fastest heat time of 1:06,01, which was quite close to Sonja Adelaar’s national record of 1:04,73 that was set 10 years ago.
On Tuesday, Smalley was 35th fastest in the 200m individual medley heats in 2:22,81, which was more than three seconds off Adelaar’s Open record of 2:19,33.
Namibia’s four swimmers teamed up to set three national Open mixed relay records.
In the 4x50m medley relay, they finished 28th overall in 1:46,63; in the 4×50 freestyle relay they set the 26th fastest time of 1:39,68, which broke the old national record of 1:42,86 by more than three seconds; and in the 4x100m medley relay they set the 22nd fastest time of 3:54,78, which took more than 24 seconds off the previous national record of 4:18,80.
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