Olympic journey ends for Pakistani swimmers as Durrani and Jehanara finish last in 200m freestyle

Pakistani swimmers Ahmed Durrani and Jehanara Nabi finished last in the 200-meter freestyle preliminaries at the 2024 Summer Olympics in France on Sunday.

Durrani, a national record holder, completed his race with splits of 26.62, 29.21, 31.06, and 31.78, finishing fourth in his heat and last overall with a time of 1:58.67. This was a significant drop from his performance at the Malaysian Age Group Championships in April, where he set a national record with a time of 1:55.68, with splits of 27.15, 29.33, 29.94, and 29.26.

Nabi, the women’s competitor, finished third in her heat and 26th overall with a time of 2:10.69. At the Thailand Age Group Swimming Championships in April, she set a personal best and national record of 2:08.57, but she was nearly two seconds slower at the Olympics. Her splits of 29.80, 32.49, 33.80, and 34.60 placed her ahead of swimmers from Saudi Arabia, Nepal, the United Arab Emirates, and Albania.

Durrani and Nabi, along with sprinter Faiqa Riaz, are three of Pakistan’s Olympic wild card entrants. Wild card entries are given to countries whose athletes would not otherwise qualify for the event.

Every South Asian swimmer at the Olympics has competed as a wild card entry, except for Sri Lanka’s Matthew Abeysinghe, who made the Olympic ‘B’ cut for the Rio 2016 Olympics in the 100m freestyle, and India’s Sajan Prakash, who made the Olympic ‘A’ cut for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics in the 200m butterfly.

India’s wild card swimmers also competed on Sunday, with 14-year-old Dhinidhi Desinghu finishing ahead of Nabi with a time of 2:06.96, and two-time Olympian Srihari Nataraj swimming a 55.01 in the 100m backstroke. Like their Pakistani counterparts, both Indian swimmers are national record holders in their respective events but failed to achieve personal bests in Paris.