2026 European Championships Previews: Para Swimmers Race Sprint Free Occasions Before Full Champs In Sept

2026 European Swimming Championships

The World Para European Swimming Championships are nonetheless slated for September and can function a full complement of occasions for Europe’s largest para swimming stars to race. Before these full championships, swimming followers will get a preview of what’s to return on the upcoming European Championships in Paris, France. Para swimmers will return to La Defense Arena subsequent week after the positioning performed host to the 2024 Paralympic Championships.

Next week, simply the 50 and 100 freestyle are on provide for the ladies’s and males’s para swimmers. Swimmers within the S1-S14 lessons are welcome to compete, as are swimmers within the S15, S16, and S21 classifications based on European Aquatics competitors constructions. Competition outcomes will likely be decided utilizing a points-based system, permitting swimmers from totally different classifications to compete towards one another. (These championships will use the World Para Swimming Points system for lessons S1-S14, and the World Aquatics Points System for swimmers within the S15, S16, and S21 lessons).

Given that there’s a full World Para European Swimming Championships going down in Kocaeli, Turkey in a couple of month’s time, a lot of para swimming’s largest stars are getting the final bit of coaching in and won’t return to La Defense Arena. The ladies’s dash freestyle occasions every have 11 entries, whereas the boys’s occasions have 9.

Women

A New Breakout Star

One of the most important names to observe in these races will likely be Turkey’s Dafne Kurt. She made her debut on the worldwide para swimming stage final 12 months on the 2025 World Para Swimming Championships. She left a giant impression, profitable the 50 freestyle, 100 freestyle, 100 backstroke, 100 butterfly, and 200 IM all within the S10/SM10 classification.

Most relevantly for subsequent week’s races, her profitable instances of 27.21 within the 50 freestyle S10 and 59.08 within the 100 freestyle S10 have been each European data for her classification. Her 27.21 places her simply .11 seconds away from the 27.10 world report Yi Chen swam on the 2024 Paralympics. Kurt, like most of the different swimmers competing, is probably going all in for subsequent month’s World Para Swimming Championships, which happen in her residence nation. That means she won’t be at her peak type this week however in a points-based system, getting near a lifetime finest so near the world report may very well be all Kurt must win the 50 freestyle occasion.

The Dutch Contingent

The Netherlands’ has the most important contingent of entrants on the ladies’s aspect, fielding 4 swimmers—Liesette Bruinsma, Lisa Kruger, Florianne Bultje, and Irene van Drimmelen.

Bruinsma and Kruger each picked up medals on the 2024 Paralympics. Bruinsma—whose first main worldwide competitors was the 2016 IPC Swimming European Championships—gained two medals on the Paris Paralympics, rising her Paralympic haul to eight. She earned gold within the 400 freestyle S11 and added a silver medal within the 100 freestyle S11. She upgraded that 100 freestyle S11 silver to gold a 12 months later on the 2025 World Para Swimming Championships in Singapore. As a part of her medal assortment at these championships she additionally earned bronze within the 50 freestyle S11.

Kruger owns seven Paralympic medals throughout three appearances. She took 100 freestyle S10 bronze on the Tokyo Paralympics, however her specialty are the backstroke, breaststroke, and IM occasions. Those occasions account for six of her seven Paralympic medals and he or she earned her first World Para Championships gold since 2022 by profitable gold within the 100 breaststroke SB9 in Singapore.

Bruinsma and Kruger would be the two most important swimmers from the Dutch entrants to keep watch over, however Bultje and van Drimmelen shouldn’t be discounted. Two of Bultje’s three main worldwide medals come from relays, together with silver on the 2024 Paralympics within the blended 4×100 medley relay 34 factors. Her lone particular person medal is a Worlds 50 freestyle S9 bronze from 2023. Van Drimmelen is a backstroke specialist—she owns the 50 backstroke S11 world report and the 100 backstroke S11 European report—and it will likely be fascinating to see what she brings to the dash freestyle occasions.

Portugal’s 1-2 Punch

The Portugese ladies are a small however mighty group as Susana Veiga and Ana Castro are each dash specialists. The 25-year-old Veiga competes within the S9 class; she is the previous European report within the 50 freestyle S9 with a 28.85.

Castro is the newly minter Portugese report holder within the 100 freestyle S8. She swam a 1:16.35 on the Barcelona World Series cease to realize the mark. Castro has been glorious at that World Series cease in March for the previous two seasons—now we wait to see whether or not she’ll be capable of convey that momentum ahead to the tip of the summer time.

Don’t Forget

Agata Koupilova has asserted herself as one of many main sprinters of the S5 classification. Now 26, the Czech star earned silver within the 50/100/200 freestyle S5 on the 2025 World Para Swimming Championships. That wasn’t the primary time she’s been on the rostrum of all three dash occasions at a championships; she achieved the identical on the 2024 World Para European Championships, accumulating bronze in all three occasions.

Men

While there are a good variety of dash specialists within the ladies’s occasions, the boys’s occasions largely function swimmers taking over some non-primary occasions.

The Dutch Contingent Part 2

Like on the ladies’s aspect, the Netherlands has 4 entrants, once more essentially the most of any nation. 27-year-old Rogier Dorsman leads the Dutch males. He’s gained six Paralympic medals, together with 5 gold. Three of these medals come from the Paris Paralympics, the place he struck gold in each the 100 breaststroke SB11 and 200 IM SM11.

Unlike most of the different swimmers in these races, Dorsman has gained dash freestyle medals at a serious worldwide championship. His finest freestyle race is the 400, however in 2022 he doubled up on gold medals within the 50/100 freestyle on the 2022 World Para Swimming Championships. He repeated because the 50 freestyle S11 world champion in 2023 and took silver within the 100 freestyle S11. At the latest Worlds, he grabbed bronze within the 100 freestyle S11.

Despite incomes six Paralympic medals and 20 World Championship medals to this point in his profession, Dorsman solely has two World Para European Championship medals. He’s coming off setting a 100/200 breaststroke SB11 world data this spring (1:09.61/2:35.37) so look ahead to him to doubtlessly use these championships as a launching pad to some main {hardware} subsequent month.

Bas Takken, like his Dutch teammate Dorsman, has discovered success on the worldwide stage within the 400 freestyle. He has not translated that right down to the dash freestyle occasions, selecting as a substitute to prioritize distance—he’s the S10 world report holder within the 800 freestyle, a mark he’s held since 2017. Similarly, Thomas van Wanroojj has no main worldwide medals in dash freestyle. The 23-year-old is a backstroke, breaststroke, and IM specialist. He was the Tokyo Paralympics bronze medalist within the 200 IM SM13. Then, in Singapore, he gained silver within the 100 breaststroke SB13 and 100 backstroke S13.

The Netherlands’ rounds out their males’s para swimmers with Thijs van Hofweegen. The S6 swimmer is a two-time Paralympic silver medalist, incomes his lone particular person Paralympic medal in Rio with a 400 freestyle S6 silver medal. He’s an achieved mid-distance and distancae freestyler however has additionally dropped right down to the dash freestyle occasions. He gained 50 freestyle S6 bronze on the 2022 World Para Swimming Championships. Earlier in his profession, he gained 50/100/400 freestyle S6 gold on the 2018 World Para European Swimming Championships and added a silver within the 100 freestyle S6.

200 Butterfly World Record Holders Take On Sprint Freestyle

Denmark’s Alexander Hillhouse and Portugal’s Diogo Cancela personal their classification’s 200 butterfly world report. Both will combine it up this week and take a look at the dash freestyles on for measurement.

Hillhouse made a splash in his Paralympic debut two years in the past. He was the one Danish para swimmer within the males’s occasions and he swam to gold within the 100 butterfly S14. He’s earned nearly all of his worldwide {hardware} in that occasion, including Worlds silver and gold post-Paris). But, he’s additionally the 200 butterfly S14 world report holder, swimming 2:05.90 final April.

Cancela set his S8 mark two years earlier, swimming 2:15.50 throughout an April meet in Eindhoven and breaking the previous mark by three seconds. Two years, in the past, Cancela earned his first Paralympic medal with a bronze within the 200 IM SM8. He’s a part of a powerful duo of Portuguese swimmers in these races. Marco Menesese can also be set to race; the 25-year-old is primarily a backstroke specialist however has additionally set Portuguese data within the 200 IM SM11.

The Austrian staff additionally has a stable tandem with  Andreas Onea and Andreas Ernhofer each entered. Ernhofer holds a number of Austrian data and is a breaststroke/IM specialist. Onea was the Rio Paralympics bronze medalist within the 100 breaststroke SB8 and earned the identical coloration medal within the occasion on the 2022 World Para Swimming Championships.