# Swimming at the 2024 Summer Olympics – Men's 200 metre backstroke

The men's 200 metre backstroke event at the 2024 Summer Olympics was held from 31 July to 1 August 2024 at Paris La Défense Arena, which was converted to a swimming pool for the swimming events. Since an Olympic size swimming pool is 50 metres long, each competitor had to swim four lengths of the pool.
The USA's Ryan Murphy and Hungary's Hubert Kós were the favourites going into the event. Other contenders were Great Britain's Luke Greenbank, Hugo González of Spain and Roman Mityukov of Switzerland. Greenbank was eliminated in the heats after getting disqualified for swimming more than 15 metres underwater, while Murphy did not qualify for the final.
In the final, Greece's Apostolos Christou let for the first three quarters of the race, but Kós overtook him on the final 50 metres to win gold with a time of 1:54.26. Christou claimed the silver medal with a national record of 1:54.82, and Mityukov won the bronze with another national record of 1:56.85. France's fourth-place finisher, Mewen Tomac also broke his country's national record with 1:55.38, while the seventh-place finisher, Pieter Coetze, broke the African record with 1:55.60.

## Background

The USA's Ryan Murphy won the event at the 2016 Olympics, won silver at the 2020 Games and won the event at the 2022 World Championships. At the 2023 World Championships, Hungary's Hubert Kós won gold, with Murphy taking silver. Murphy qualified with for the Paris Olympics with a time of 1:54.33 at the US Olympic Trials—the fastest time of the season, where Keaton Jones also qualified with 1:54.61—the third fastest time of the season.
Other competitors included Great Britain's defending Olympic bronze medallist Luke Greenbank, 2024 World Champion Hugo González of Spain, the 2023 Championships bronze medallist and 2024 Championships silver medallist Roman Mityukov of Switzerland, and 2024 Championships bronze medallist Pieter Coetze of South Africa. Russia's defending Olympic champion Evgeny Rylov was not eligible to compete.
SwimSwam predicted Murphy would win and Kós would take second, while Swimming World predicted Kós would win and Murphy would take second. Both predicted Hugo González would take third.

## Qualification

Each National Olympic Committee (NOC) was permitted to enter a maximum of two qualified athletes in each individual event, but only if both of them had attained the Olympic Qualifying Time (OQT). For this event, the OQT was 1:57.50. World Aquatics then considered athletes qualifying through universality; NOCs were given one event entry for each gender, which could be used by any athlete regardless of qualification time, providing the spaces had not already been taken by athletes from that nation who had achieved the OQT. Finally, the rest of the spaces were filled by athletes who had met the Olympic Consideration Time (OCT), which was 01:58.09 for this event. In total, 27 athletes qualified through achieving the OQT, two athletes qualified through universality places and one athlete qualified through achieving the OCT.
Top 10 fastest qualification times :
| Swimmer | Country | Time | Competition |
| Hubert Kós | Hungary | 01:54:14 | 2023 World Aquatics Championships |
| Ryan Murphy | United States | 01:54:33 | 2024 United States Olympic Trials |
| Hugo González | Spain | 01:54:51 | 2024 Spanish Summer Open Championships |
| Keaton Jones | United States | 01:54:61 | 2024 United States Olympic Trials |
| Roman Mityukov | Switzerland | 01:55:34 | 2023 World Aquatics Championships |
| Xu Jiayu | China | 01:55:37 | 2022 Asian Games |
| Apostolos Siskos | Greece | 01:55:42 | 2024 European Championships |
| Mewen Tomac | France | 01:55:54 | 2024 French Elite Championships |
| Bradley Woodward | Australia | 01:55:56 | 2023 Japan Open |
| Ádám Telegdy | Hungary | 01:55:57 | 2024 Hungarian Championships |

## Heats

Three heats took place on 31 July 2024, starting at 11:21. The swimmers with the best 16 times in the heats advanced to the semifinals. Mityukov qualified with the fastest time of 1:56.62. Kós, Murphy, González, Jones and Coetze all qualified.
Greenbank won the fourth heat but was disqualified for swimming more than 15 metres underwater off the start. China's Xu Jaiyu, the sixth seed for the event, did not show up to his heat, without giving an explanation. Denilson Cyprianos of Zimbabwe lowered his own national record in the event to 2:01.91.
Results :
| Rank | Heat | Lane | Swimmer | Nation | Time | Notes |
| 1 | 3 | 5 | Roman Mityukov | Switzerland | 1:56.62 | Q |
| 2 | 4 | 2 | Lukas Märtens | Germany | 1:56.89 | Q |
| 3 | 2 | 6 | Pieter Coetze | South Africa | 1:56.92 | Q |
| 4 | 4 | 4 | Hubert Kós | Hungary | 1:57.01 | Q |
| 5 | 3 | 4 | Ryan Murphy | United States | 1:57.03 | Q |
| 6 | 2 | 4 | Hugo González | Spain | 1:57.08 | Q |
| 7 | 2 | 7 | Apostolos Christou | Greece | 1:57.18 | Q |
| 8 | 3 | 7 | Hidekazu Takehara | Japan | 1:57.23 | Q |
| 9 | 4 | 3 | Apostolos Siskos | Greece | 1:57.26 | Q |
| 10 | 3 | 2 | Lee Ju-ho | South Korea | 1:57.39 | Q |
| 11 | 4 | 5 | Keaton Jones | United States | 1:57.54 | Q |
| 12 | 4 | 7 | Oliver Morgan | Great Britain | 1:57.56 | Q |
| 13 | 3 | 3 | Mewen Tomac | France | 1:57.62 | Q |
| 14 | 2 | 1 | Thomas Ceccon | Italy | 1:57.69 | Q |
| 15 | 2 | 2 | Yohann Ndoye-Brouard | France | 1:57.92 | Q |
| 16 | 4 | 6 | Ádám Telegdy | Hungary | 1:57.98 | Q |
| 17 | 3 | 1 | Ksawery Masiuk | Poland | 1:58.01 | |
| 18 | 1 | 4 | Se-Bom Lee | Australia | 1:58.30 | |
| 19 | 4 | 8 | Blake Tierney | Canada | 1:58.39 | |
| 20 | 3 | 6 | Oleksandr Zheltyakov | Ukraine | 1:58.41 | |
| 21 | 1 | 5 | Kane Follows | New Zealand | 1:58.63 | |
| 22 | 1 | 3 | David Gerchik | Israel | 1:58.79 | |
| 23 | 2 | 8 | Kai van Westering | Netherlands | 1:58.99 | |
| 24 | 3 | 8 | Matteo Restivo | Italy | 1:59.05 | |
| 25 | 2 | 3 | Bradley Woodward | Australia | 2:00.50 | |
| 26 | 1 | 6 | Yeziel Morales | Puerto Rico | 2:00.60 | |
| 27 | 1 | 2 | Ziyad Saleem | Sudan | 2:01.44 | |
| 28 | 1 | 7 | Denilson Cyprianos | Zimbabwe | 2:01.91 | NR |
| | 2 | 5 | Xu Jiayu | China | DNS | |
| | 4 | 1 | Luke Greenbank | Great Britain | DSQ | |

## Semifinals

Two semifinals took place on 31 July, starting at 21:47. The swimmers with the best eight times in the semifinals advanced to the final. Kós won the first semifinal with 1:55.96, and Mityukov won the second with 1:56.05. Murphy did not qualify.
Results :
| Rank | Heat | Lane | Swimmer | Nation | Time | Notes |
| 1 | 1 | 5 | Hubert Kós | Hungary | 1:55.96 | Q |
| 2 | 2 | 4 | Roman Mityukov | Switzerland | 1:56.05 | Q |
| 3 | 2 | 5 | Pieter Coetze | South Africa | 1:56.09 | Q |
| 4 | 1 | 4 | Lukas Märtens | Germany | 1:56.33 | Q |
| 4 | 2 | 6 | Apostolos Christou | Greece | 1:56.33 | Q |
| 6 | 2 | 7 | Keaton Jones | United States | 1:56.39 | Q |
| 7 | 2 | 1 | Mewen Tomac | France | 1:56.43 | Q |
| 8 | 1 | 3 | Hugo González | Spain | 1:56.52 | Q |
| 9 | 1 | 1 | Thomas Ceccon | Italy | 1:56.59 | |
| 10 | 2 | 3 | Ryan Murphy | United States | 1:56.62 | |
| 11 | 1 | 2 | Lee Ju-ho | South Korea | 1:56.76 | |
| 12 | 1 | 7 | Oliver Morgan | Great Britain | 1:57.28 | |
| 13 | 1 | 8 | Ádám Telegdy | Hungary | 1:57.58 | |
| 14 | 2 | 2 | Apostolos Siskos | Greece | 1:57.77 | |
| 15 | 1 | 6 | Hidekazu Takehara | Japan | 1:58.03 | |
| 16 | 2 | 8 | Yohann Ndoye-Brouard | France | 1:58.65 | |

## Final

The final took place at 20:37 on 31 July. Greece's Apostolos Christou led the race at the 50 metre, 100 metre and 150 metre splits. At the 150 metre split he was over a second ahead of Kós in second. Over the final 50 metres, Kós overtook Christou to claim the gold medal, finishing with a time of 1:54.26. Christou won the silver with a national record of 1:54.82, and Mityukov won the bronze with a national record of 1:54.85. France's Mewen Tomac finished fourth with 1:55.38 which was also a new national record. Coetze finished seventh with 1:55.60, which broke the African record set by George Du Rand in 2009. Rand's record was set with a supersuit, before they were banned in 2009.
Kós' win made him the second Hungarian Olympic gold medallist. Christou's second-place finish made him the first Greek Olympic medallist in pool swimming since the first Olympics in 1896. SwimSwam said his performance was "one of the biggest surprises of the meet", with him being the oldest swimmer in the final and having the slowest personal best.
Results :
| Rank | Lane | Swimmer | Nation | Time | Notes |
| | 4 | Hubert Kós | Hungary | 1:54.26 | |
| | 2 | Apostolos Christou | Greece | 1:54.82 | NR |
| | 5 | Roman Mityukov | Switzerland | 1:54.85 | NR |
| 4 | 1 | Mewen Tomac | France | 1:55.38 | NR |
| 5 | 7 | Keaton Jones | United States | 1:55.39 | |
| 6 | 8 | Hugo González | Spain | 1:55.47 | |
| 7 | 3 | Pieter Coetze | South Africa | 1:55.60 | AF |
| 8 | 6 | Lukas Märtens | Germany | 1:55.97 | |
Statistics :
| Name | 50 metre split | 100 metre split | 150 metre split | Time | Stroke rate (strokes/min) |
| Hubert Kós | 00:27.06 | 00:56.30 | 01:25.38 | 1:54.26 | 40.4 |
| Apostolos Christou | 00:26.39 | 00:55.14 | 01:24.36 | 1:54.82 | 40.3 |
| Roman Mityukov | 00:27.16 | 00:56.36 | 01:25.75 | 1:54.85 | 43.5 |
| Mewen Tomac | 00:27.25 | 00:56.56 | 01:26.44 | 1:55.38 | 43.1 |
| Keaton Jones | 00:27.31 | 00:56.40 | 01:26.09 | 1:55.39 | 42.8 |
| Hugo González | 00:26.99 | 00:55.89 | 01:25.72 | 1:55.47 | 41.0 |
| Pieter Coetze | 00:26.83 | 00:56.53 | 01:25.73 | 1:55.60 | 41.7 |
| Lukas Märtens | 00:27.11 | 00:56.60 | 01:26.40 | 1:55.97 | 41.3 |