Swimming World Championships: Popovici stunned by Richards in 200m freestyle

Swimming World Championships: Romanian swim star David Popovici faded badly on the home straight as his rivals closed in, and ended up out of the medals completely as Britain’s Matthew Richards took gold in 1min, 44.30sec.

Matthew Richards of Britain (L) and David Popovici of Romania (R) during the Men’s 200m freestyle finals at the World Swimming Championships in Fukuoka, Japan. | Photo Credit: AP

Romanian swim star David Popovici said he felt “awful” after finishing fourth in a stunning upset in the men’s 200m freestyle at swimming’s world championships on Tuesday.

Popovici is one of the sport’s brightest stars and was a red-hot favourite going into the race in Fukuoka.

The 18-year-old defending champion comfortably led from the start and looked set to coast home as he reached the final 50 metres.

But he faded badly on the home straight as his rivals closed in, and ended up out of the medals completely as Britain’s Matthew Richards took gold in 1min, 44.30sec.

Britain’s Tom Dean was second on 1:44.32 and South Korea’s Hwang Sun-woo was third on 1:44.42, leaving Popovici fourth on 1:44.90.

Popovici said he believed his shock defeat could turn out to be “a good thing” as he eyes gold at next year’s Paris Olympics.

“If you have the absolute perfect race and you have nothing else to improve, you know that you’ve basically reached the top, the limit,” he said.

“You know that you can do nothing better from there on. I’m glad it happened now and I’m sure it has a meaning and I’m going to learn from it,” he added.

Last year in Budapest, Popovici became the first man to complete the 100m-200m freestyle double at a world championships in nearly 50 years.

Sunwoo Hwang of Team South Korea, David Popovici of Team Romania and Luke Hobson of Team United States compete in the Men’s 200m Freestyle Final on day three of the Fukuoka 2023 World Aquatics Championships. | Photo Credit: Getty Images

He followed that up by smashing the 100m freestyle world record at the European Championships in Rome.

He will attempt to defend his 100m freestyle title in Fukuoka but said first he would “sleep good and eat well and do my rundown”.

“The 100, fortunately, is two times shorter,” he said.

“That doesn’t mean it’s not going to hurt. I don’t think it’s going to hurt as bad though.”

Richards was competing in his first world championships final and said it had been “a hell of a race”.

“We knew going into that that was one of the most stacked 200 freestyle fields in a very long time. I’m really happy that we managed to get that done tonight and hopefully its the first of many,” he said.