At the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Ashihmin competed again in four swimming events. He posted FINA B-standards of 23.55 (50 m freestyle) and 51.20 (100 m freestyle) from the Russian National Championships in Moscow. In the 100 m freestyle, Ashihmin placed thirty-fourth on the morning prelims. Swimming in heat six, he shared a third seed with Greece's Spyridon Bitsakis in a matching time of 51.28. Two days later, in the 50 m freestyle, Ashihmin challenged seven other swimmers in heat four, including Kazakhstan's top sprinter Sergey Borisenko. He came up short in second place and forty-first overall with a time of 23.53, trailing Borisenko by seven hundredths of a second (0.07). He also placed twentieth as a member of the Kyrgyzstan team in the 4×100 m freestyle relay (3:25.03), and nineteenth in the 4×100 m medley relay (3:46.70).