Qin Haiyang claims first gold of 2025 at National Spring Championships

Shanghai's Qin Haiyang won the men's 100-meter breaststroke final at China's National Spring Swimming Championships in Qingdao, east China's Shandong Province, on Thursday.

It has been a little over six months since Qin helped China triumph in the men's 4×100-meter medley final at the 2024 Paris Summer Olympics, and he dominated qualifying in 58.61 seconds in Qingdao, before clocking a slightly-slower 58.66 seconds to prevail in the final. Sun Jiajun of Hubei placed second and Jiangsu's Dong Zhihao touched the wall third.

"I should have been faster in the final than in the morning qualifiers, but I have not competed at big events for a long time, as it is about six months after the Paris Olympics, and I am still finding my form," Qin said.

In other finals, Shandong teenager Zhang Zhanshuo grabbed the men's 200-meter butterfly title in 1:56.60, holding off runner-up Xu Yizhou from Zhejiang and third-place finisher Wang Baojun of Hubei.

Shandong's Ji Xinjie posted a time of 1:46.76 to win the men's 200-meter freestyle. The silver went to He Yubo of Hebei while Xu Haibo of Hubei came in third.

Lin Tao from Guangdong won the men's 50-meter backstroke final in 25.22 seconds, 0.01 second ahead of Jiang Chenglin of Shanxi and Heilongjiang's Wang Gukailai, who tied for runner-up honors.

Wu Qingfeng of Zhejiang topped the women's 50-meter freestyle podium in 24.44 seconds. Standing next to her were Cheng Yuijie from Jiangxi in second and Liu Shuhan of Shanxi in third.

Peng Xuwei from Hubei touched wall first in the women's 200-meter backstroke final in 2:06.54, ahead of Zhejiang's Liu Yaxi and Guangdong's Li Wanwei.

19-year-old Yu Yiting secured the women's 400-meter individual medley gold medal in 2:10.73, after outpacing fellow Zhejiang swimmer Liu and Hubei's Ke Wenxi in the final.