Daniel Wiffen becomes first Irish swimmer to break a European record

Marking another historic breakthrough for Irish swimming, Daniel Wiffen set a new European short-course record over the 800 metres freestyle on the opening day of the Irish National Winter Championships at the Sport Ireland National Aquatic Centre in Dublin.

With that Wiffen becomes the first Irish swimmer to break a European swimming record over any distance, the 21-year-old from Down clocking a superb time of 7:25.96, two seconds under the previous record (7:27.94) set last year by Italy’s Gregorio Paltrinieri, the reigning world champion.

Subject to ratification by the European Governing Body LEN, Wiffen’s time is also the fourth fastest ever in the short course (25m) pool, now only 2.5 seconds off the world record set by the American Grant Hackett in 2008.

Halfway through, the Loughborough University-based swimmer also set a new Irish 400m freestyle record, clocking 3:41.63, to knock a second off his previous record of 3:42.42.

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It means in the last week alone, Wiffen has broken the Irish record in the 800m freestyle three times; last weekend, at the Scottish Short Course Championships, he also swam a 1500m Irish record of 14:14.45 placing him sixth in the world, and the fastest man in 2022, plus another record time of 7:35.71 over 800m, which he broke here by some 10 seconds.

The Irish National winter Championships (formerly known as the Irish National Short Course Championships) will also see Wiffen return to the pool on Saturday for the 400m freestyle with the promise of another record.

“Very happy, it’s obviously a very fast time and number one in the world (this year),” Wiffen said. “I knew that I’d be sub 7.30 and I was aiming for a top 10 in the world, I think that puts me fourth, but I said quietly I’d go for a European record to all my friends in Loughborough, I’m really happy.

“The 1500m was my main focus for the meet [last weekend], and I knew that since I was going to Irish I would do the 800m and 400m there because I thought the 800m could be my quickest, my better event and it’s what I qualified in the Olympics for, and it was nice to get a home crowd watching that.”

At the Scottish National Short Course Championships, he also set a new Irish record in the 400m individual medley, as well as his 800m and 1500m freestyle marks.

Competing in both the 800m and 1,500m freestyle at last year’s Tokyo Olympics, Wiffen, 21 since last July, this year also broke through a historical swimming barrier this year, when he became the first Irish athlete to crash through the 15-minute mark for the 1,500m freestyle event.

In the 50-metre long course, Wiffen also holds three of the current Irish high marks at 1,500m, 800m and 400m, all of them have been set this year too.

He trains and lives in England with his identical twin brother Nathan, who in Scotland last weekend became just the second Irish swimmer to break the 15-minute barrier when he finished third behind in brother in 14:57.50.