Having survived an endemic, Ikee would hope for a superb present at Paris.
| Photograph Credit score: AP
Leukaemia survivor Rikako Ikee will compete for Japan within the 100m butterfly on the Paris Olympics after lacking out on a person place on the Tokyo Video games three years in the past.
Three-time world champion Daiya Seto will swim the boys’s particular person medley after Japan’s 27-member staff for the Paris Video games was introduced by the nation’s Swimming Federation on Wednesday.
An 18-year-old Ikee was named MVP of the 2018 Asian Video games after claiming six golds and two silvers, and was anticipated to be one of many stars of the Tokyo Olympics.
In early 2019, a number of months after these triumphs, she was identified with leukaemia and spent round 10 months in hospital.
She solely returned to competitors in August 2020 and accomplished an unimaginable comeback by successful the 100m freestyle and 100m butterfly on the 2021 Olympic trials.
Her instances weren’t quick sufficient to qualify for the person occasions in Tokyo however the performances gained her choice for each freestyle and medley relay groups at her residence Olympics.
Now 23, Ikee secured her place within the 100m butterfly by simply 0.01sec at Japan’s trials earlier this month as she held off the fast-finishing Matsumoto Shiho to complete second in 57.34sec.
“In the long run I feel it was my lengthy arms that received the contact,” Ikee was quoted as saying by Olympics.com.
“I feel God was on my facet right now.”
The race was received in a powerful 56.91sec by 17-year-old Haiari Mazuki, one in every of a number of gifted Japanese youngsters within the staff.
Additionally heading to Paris are Mio Narita, 17, within the girls’s particular person medley and Tomoyuki Matsushita, 18, who swims the identical occasion for males.
“I am glad plenty of veterans and younger expertise made it to the nationwide staff this time,” Daichi Suzuki, the swimming federation chief, was reported as saying by Japan media.
“I hope to see them on the rostrum with Japan’s nationwide flag on their shoulders in Paris,” he added.