Gary Bejino was off to a good start but faded by the end and finished at 17th place during the preliminary heats of the men’s 200-meter individual medley SM6 of the 2020 Tokyo Paralympic Games at the Tokyo Aquatics Center, Thursday.
The Games rookie stopped the clock at 3:17.19, way slower than his entry time of 3:08.64, to end up sixth and in last on the second of the three heats.
Bejino expectedly came out of the blocks strong as he is a butterfly specialist, only he slowed down after 25 meters, with the rest of the field caught up along the way.
The 25-year-old swimmer still hung on to take fifth place after the butterfly leg with a time of 37.96, but it was his last taste of that spot as Switzerland’s Leo McCrea took over and Bejino could not recover from this point onwards.
Nelson Crispin Corzo of Colombia finished with the fastest qualifying time of 2:43.07, with reigning world champion Andrei Granichka not far behind at 2:45.95.
Bejino, on his part, will come back to the pool on Monday for the men’s 50-meter butterfly S6 heats at 8:36 a.m.
