Sport Yu Zidi
An eleven-year-old shocks the swimming world – seven seconds faster than the best Germans
Status: 03.05.2024 | Reading time: 2 minutes
A new swimming prodigy is causing a stir in China
Source: picture alliance/dpa/Martin Schutt
A young swimmer from China first caused a national sensation and then finally made international headlines. At just eleven years old, she is clearly faster than the German champion in the 400 meter individual medley.
Recently they have become rare: the swimming prodigies who have duped the competition at the Olympic Games and World Championships and sometimes caused incredulous amazement. But now news from China is attracting attention, announcing the appearance of such a child prodigy in future title fights: In Shenzhen, an eleven-year-old has shaken up the national championships.
And in several ways. It is not unusual for young swimmers to complete a large number of starts in competitions. However, Yu Zidi’s workload with ten starts at the Chinese championships is a number that stands out. In general: at the age of eleven, being involved not only in year-class championships but also in the open class is a rarity. Finishing second in a final finally caught the attention of the international swimming world.
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Yu Zidi’s 4:40.97 minutes in the 400 meter individual medley secured her silver place behind Yu Yiting. The 18-year-old winner is one of 23 Chinese swimmers who tested positive for the banned substance trimetazidine (TMZ) before the 2021 Olympic Games in Tokyo but were not punished. A scandal uncovered by the ARD doping editorial team, the “New York Times” and the “Daily Telegraph” that has shaken the international sports world in recent weeks and is placing the performance of Chinese swimmers at the summer games in Paris under particular scrutiny.
Seven seconds faster than the currently best German
Yu Zidi will not compete at the major event in France. But hardly anyone can doubt that she will enter the international arena in the future. At the German Championships she would have won the undisputed title with her 400 meter individual medley time: She was seven seconds faster than Noelle Benkler, who won the final of the championships in Berlin a week ago (4:48.07).
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Yu Zidi only missed the Olympic standard required by the world association by 2.5 seconds. However, the current world record is still a swimming world away: it is 4:25:87 minutes, set last year by the Canadian Summer McIntosh.
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Also noteworthy: She swam the 400 meter freestyle in 4:10.73 minutes, 23 seconds faster than the German age group record for twelve-year-olds, as the specialist portal swimsportnews.de reports. The record has stood since 1979 and is held by Trixi Kubin.
