By Tom Decent
An 11-year-old Chinese swimmer has fallen two seconds short of representing her country at this year’s Olympics after posting a 400m individual medley time that would have been quick enough to make the recent world championships finals.
Rising star Yu Zidi has been turning heads this week at China’s Olympic swimming trials in Shenzhen.
While there is no suggestion of wrongdoing from Yu, it comes after Chinese swimming was embroiled in a drugs scandal when it was revealed 23 athletes tested positive before the 2021 Olympics, with many going on to compete in Tokyo.
The World Anti-Doping Agency accepted China’s explanation that the athletes’ samples were contaminated with trimetazidine in a kitchen.
Yu touched the wall in second place in the final of the 400m individual medley, in a time of four minutes, 40.97 seconds.
Australian coach Denis Cotterell, who works with the Chinese swimming team, confirmed to this masthead that Yu is only 11.
Chinese 11-year-old swimmer Yu Zidi.Credit: Twitter
Dimitrios Loundras is the youngest Olympian in history, having represented Greece in gymnastics in 1896 when he was just 10 years and 218 days old. Loundras won a bronze medal in a team event.
Yu finished just behind 18-year-old Yu Yiting, who won the race in 4:39.60.
Yu Yiting, who has won multiple world championships medals, was one of the 23 Chinese athletes caught up in the reports of positive tests.
Unfortunately for Yu Zidi, her time was just outside the World Aquatics Olympic qualifying mark of 4:38.53.
Although Yu won’t race at the Olympics, she has taken the swimming world by storm with a time that is just 15 seconds outside Summer McIntosh’s 400m medley world record of 4:25.87.
Kaylee McKeown set an Australian record last week in the same race with 4:28.22. It was the fastest time in the world this year.
Yu would have finished third in the event at the Australian Open Championships on the Gold Coast last week.
Yu’s time of 4:40.97 would have been good enough to finish sixth at the world championships this year. With a stronger field of swimmers in the world championships last year, in Fukuoka, Yu would have placed seventh.
The 11-year-old’s time would have been just outside eighth place in the women’s 400m medley final at the Tokyo Olympics.
McKeown raced a 400m medley for the first time in 2017 as a 15-year-old at the Australian Age Championships. She touched the wall in 4:45.75.
No Australian under the age of 16 has gone faster than Yu.
Hayley Lewis holds the Australian under-15 record with 4:42.65.
China’s swimmers have recorded some eye-catching times during their Olympic trials.
World-record holder in the men’s 100m freestyle, Pan Zhanle, won the two-lap race at China’s trials in a time of 46.97. It is lower than Australian freestyler Kyle Chalmers’ personal best of 47.08.
Pan achieved a world record of 46.80 at the world championships in Doha this year as a lead-off swimmer in a relay.
Meanwhile, Yang Junxuan set a Chinese national record with 52.68 in the women’s 100m freestyle, while 20-year-old Tang Qianting clocked 1:04.39 in the women’s 100m breaststroke final to become the fourth-best performer in history.
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