Meilutyte, Hafnaoui & Steenbergen Among New Names Confirmed For Mare Nostrum

By James Sutherland on SwimSwam

2023 Mare Nostrum Swim Tour

• May 13-21 (three stops)
  • Canet, FRA – May 13-14
  • Barcelona, ESP – May 17-18
  • Monaco – May 20-21
• LCM (50m)
• Meet Central
• Live Stream
• Initial Entries (Barcelona)
• Notable Entries (Monaco)

The list of confirmed swimmers for the upcoming Mare Nostrum Swim Tour continues to grow as a provisional entry list for the Barcelona leg has been released.

Athletes will have up until May 3 to enter (and May 2 for Canet), so the official entries will be released then.

The initial entrants for Barcelona include several of the names who were confirmed to be competing in Monaco, including the likes of Siobhan Haughey, Cate Campbell, Lydia Jacoby, Thomas Ceccon and Michael Andrew, though there have been a number of new additions to the series (as these are provisional entries, it’s possible swimmers missing from certain meets will end up racing at them).

Among the new swimmers committed to competing in Barcelona include 2022 world champion and world record-setter Ruta Meilutyte, who came out of retirement to re-establish herself as one of the world’s premier sprint breaststrokers.

Meilutyte won gold last summer at the World Championships in the women’s 50 breast and added a bronze medal in the 100 breast, and she went on to claim the short course world title in the 50-meter event in world record fashion in December.

Her entry into the series sets up some marquee breaststroke matchups on the women’s side, with reigning 100 breast Olympic champion Lydia Jacoby and World Championship medalist Lara van Niekerk also in the field.

Japan’s Reona Aoki, the fastest woman in the 100 breast last year, will join them in Barcelona, and her countrymate Rikako Ikee is also entered.

Another intriguing addition is Tunisian Ahmed Hafnaoui, the Tokyo Olympic champion in the men’s 400 freestyle who has been quiet since his gold medal triumph, sitting out of the 2022 World Championships prior to heading to Indiana University in the NCAA last fall. However, Hafnaoui was ruled a partial qualifier and didn’t compete collegiately this past season, so he’s only raced a handful of times in the last 16 months.

A list of Dutch swimmers, including 2022 short course world champion and LC European champion Marrit Steenbergen and sprinters Kim Busch and Thom De Boer are entered for Barcelona, as is a group of British athletes that’s headlined by Freya Anderson, Lewis Burras, James Guy and Anna Hopkin.

Other new additions on the men’s side that weren’t listed in the Monaco entry list include Dylan Carter, Alessandro Miressi, Alberto Razzetti, Danas Rapsys, Nyls Korstanje, Simone Cerasuolo and Shane Ryan.

Other new names on the women’s side include Maaike de Waard, Beryl Gastaldello and Ellen Walshe.

There are some key names who aren’t listed for Barcelona who are for Monaco, such as Sarah Sjostrom, Kristof Milak and the Canadian team, though athletes will have until May 3 to be entered.

SwimSwam: Meilutyte, Hafnaoui & Steenbergen Among New Names Confirmed For Mare Nostrum