DUBAI: Saudi swimmer Youssef Bouarish has been eliminated from the Men’s 100m Butterfly competition at Tokyo 2020, while Egyptian teenager Ramadan Youssef was left celebrating reaching the semifinal after finishing second in his heat at the Tokyo Aquatics Center on Thursday afternoon.
Bouarish finished second out of three in Heat 1, but his time of 56.29 seconds — a new personal best — was not enough to see him qualify as one of the fastest 16 swimmers from the day’s eight races.
The Egyptian swimmer, on the other hand, came in second in Heat 5 with a time of 51.67 seconds, only 0.13 seconds behind winner Nyls Korstanje and ahead of Jiajun Sun of China in third.
The 19-year-old Youssef will now take part in Friday morning’s Men’s 100m Butterfly semifinals, starting from 4:30 a.m. Saudi Arabia time.
While the early exit will be disappointing for the 21-year-old Bouarish, Tokyo 2020 was always going to be an experience-gathering exercise for future regional and international competitions.
His path to the top of Saudi swimming has been prodigious, ultimately leading all the way to Tokyo 2020.
As a 5-year-old, Bouarish almost drowned on a visit to the seaside with his family. His father suggested he start attending swimming classes and from there grew a love affair with the sport.
As a 15-year-old, he won three gold medals at the 2016 Gulf Cooperation Council Championship in Dammam. A year later, he won bronze in the 50m Butterfly at the Arab Youth Championship and followed that up with another bronze in the same category at the Arab Championship 2018.
At the 2018 Youth Olympic Games in Argentina, he broke all previous records held by Saudi swimmers in four categories.
