200m Breast at Japan Swim: Kosuke Kitajima 2:08.00, Ryo Tateishi 2:08.17 (With Video)

(Thanks to Swimmer's Daily and  真之介 山田 for the video)

Three things I love about this video:

1. The incredible times both Kitajima and Tateishi lay down. Both men are inside the previous textile best time.
2. How utterly exhausted both men are after the race. It broke them.
3. Kitajima going over to console 17 year old Akihiro Yamaguchi, who had just swum the race of his life to finish in 2:09.70 (4th in the world this year) and still miss the team for London. Having the world's greatest ever men's breaststroker giving you a tap on the head has got to make you feel at least a tiny bit better about things.

I said it on Twitter, but I will say it again - With every new accomplishment Kitajima picks up, he continues to move further ahead of the chasing pack when it comes to the greatest breaststroker of all time discussion. In terms of domination in one stroke, Kitajima is in very select company.

Japan Swim 2010 Recap

The Japanese nationals have produced some outstanding swims and not all of them from the swimmers you would expect.

My star of the meet

Ryo Tateishi



A clean sweep of the Breaststroke events was expected at this competition, but Kosuke Kitajima was the man tipped for the feat. Instead Ryo Tateishi took the honours in the 50m, 100m and 20m Breast. In doing so he vaulted himself to the top of the world rankings in the 100m and 200m and into the consciousness of world swimming.

Tateishi's times were as follows - 50m - 27.62 (third in the world this year), 100m - 59.84 (first in the world), 200m - 2:09.21 (first in the world).

With the exception of the 200m, where the double-double Olympic champion had a poor second half of the race, Tateishi beat an in-form Kitajima.

Kitajima has long flown the flag alone for male Japanese breaststrokers, but he now has some serious company. It should drive both men onto great things in the next few years.