200 metres Backstroke, Men

There was no clear favorite in this event, although Hungarian Hubert Kós, the 2023 World Champion, was given a slight edge. Kós was best known as another pupil of American coach Bob Bowman, who had trained Michael Phelps and French superstar Léon Marchand. Spain’s Hugo González was also highly considered as he had won the 2024 World Championship, but that was not well attended because of its proximity to the 2024 Olympics.

In the heats, Great Britain’s Luke Greenbank seemingly had the fastest qualifier in 1:56.08, but he was disqualified for staying underwater longer permitted after one of his turns. In the final, Greece’s Apostolos Christou took the lead early and held it through 150 metres, over a full second ahead of Kós at that point. But Christou had the slowest finish on the final lap and would barely hang on for a silver medal. Kós had the fastest finish of the finalists and came home for the gold medal. He had been in fourth after one lap but gradually moved through the field to come home in first. After Christou, Swiss Roman Mityukov started slowly but finished strongly for the bronze medal. González had been either second or third for the first three laps but struggled coming home and finished sixth.

Christou’s medal was the first for Greece in pool swimming since 1896. Mityukov’s medal was only the fourth for Swiss men in swimming, after Étienne Dagon in the 1984 200 metre breaststroke, Jérémy Desplanches in the 200 IM at Tokyo, and Noè Ponti in the 100 fly, also in 2020. Ryan Murphy (USA), the 2016 gold medalist and 2020 silver medalist, also competed but did not make the final, placing 10th in the semi-finals.