Swimming at the 1988 Summer Olympics – Men's 200 metre backstroke

Men's 200 metre backstroke at the Games of the XXIV Olympiad
Venue	Jamsil Indoor Swimming Pool
Date	22 September 1988 (heats & finals)
Competitors	44 from 32 nations
Winning time	1:59.37
Medalists
Igor Polyansky  Soviet Union Frank Baltrusch  East Germany Paul Kingsman  New Zealand

The men's 200 metre backstroke event at the 1988 Summer Olympics took place on 22 September at the Jamsil Indoor Swimming Pool in Seoul, South Korea.

Records

Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.

World record	Igor Polyansky (URS)	1:58.14	Erfurt, East Germany	3 March 1985
Olympic record	Rick Carey (USA)	1:58.99	Los Angeles, United States	31 July 1984

Results

Heats

Rule: The eight fastest swimmers advance to final A (Q), while the next eight to final B (q).

Rank	Heat	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	6	Sergei Zabolotnov	Soviet Union	2:01.27	Q
2	5	Frank Baltrusch	East Germany	2:01.49	Q
3	4	Dirk Richter	East Germany	2:01.54	Q
4	6	Igor Polyansky	Soviet Union	2:01.70	Q
5	4	Dan Veatch	United States	2:01.73	Q
6	6	Jens-Peter Berndt	West Germany	2:01.77	Q
7	6	Paul Kingsman	New Zealand	2:02.20	Q
8	5	Rogério Romero	Brazil	2:02.26	Q
9	4	Georgi Mihalev	Bulgaria	2:02.71	q
10	6	Tamás Deutsch	Hungary	2:03.17	q
11	5	Martín López-Zubero	Spain	2:03.33	q
12	4	Frank Hoffmeister	West Germany	2:03.34	q
13	5	Daichi Suzuki	Japan	2:03.36	q
14	5	Stefano Battistelli	Italy	2:03.63	q, WD
15	4	Steve Bigelow	United States	2:03.64	q
16	3	Gary Binfield	Great Britain	2:03.79	q
17	4	Sean Murphy	Canada	2:03.81	q, WD
18	5	Mark Tewksbury	Canada	2:04.02	q
19	3	Alejandro Alvizuri	Peru	2:04.29
20	3	John Davey	Great Britain	2:04.70
21	6	David Holderbach	France	2:04.83
22	3	Ernesto Vela	Mexico	2:05.08
	6	Simon Upton	Australia
24	5	Eðvarð Þór Eðvarðsson	Iceland	2:05.61
25	3	Richard Gheel	Ireland	2:05.71
26	6	Lars Sørensen	Denmark	2:05.73
27	2	Stephen Cullen	Ireland	2:06.98
28	4	Pavel Vokoun	Czechoslovakia	2:07.24
29	2	Patrick Ferland	Switzerland	2:07.77
30	3	Lin Laijiu	China	2:08.28
31	2	David Lim Fong Jock	Singapore	2:08.65
32	3	Shigemori Maruyama	Japan	2:09.16
33	2	Wladimir Ribeiro	Brazil	2:11.48
34	2	Horst Niehaus	Costa Rica	2:12.83
35	2	Eric Greenwood	Costa Rica	2:15.42
36	2	Patrick Sagisi	Guam	2:15.82
37	1	Brett Halford	Zimbabwe	2:17.84
38	1	Pablo Barahona	Honduras	2:21.61
39	1	Mohamed Abdullah	United Arab Emirates	2:29.64
40	1	Mohamed Bin Abid	United Arab Emirates	2:36.21
41	1	Rami Kantari	Lebanon	2:40.29
	2	Park Dong-pil	South Korea	DSQ
	3	Charalambos Papanikolaou	Greece	DSQ
	5	Tamás Darnyi	Hungary	DSQ

Finals

Final B

Rank	Lane	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
9	6	Frank Hoffmeister	West Germany	2:01.65
10	7	Steve Bigelow	United States	2:02.95
11	3	Martín López-Zubero	Spain	2:03.70
12	8	Mark Tewksbury	Canada	2:03.79
13	4	Georgi Mihalev	Bulgaria	2:04.24
14	5	Tamás Deutsch	Hungary	2:04.42
15	2	Daichi Suzuki	Japan	2:04.67
16	1	Gary Binfield	Great Britain	2:04.90

Final A

Rank	Lane	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
	6	Igor Polyansky	Soviet Union	1:59.37
	5	Frank Baltrusch	East Germany	1:59.60
	1	Paul Kingsman	New Zealand	2:00.48	NR
4	4	Sergei Zabolotnov	Soviet Union	2:00.52
5	3	Dirk Richter	East Germany	2:01.67
6	7	Jens-Peter Berndt	West Germany	2:01.84
7	2	Dan Veatch	United States	2:02.26
8	8	Rogério Romero	Brazil	2:02.28

External links

• Official Report
• USA Swimming