Over the last couple of days, the Chengdu Sport University Sancha Lake Natatorium have been treated to one of the most memorable periods in Finswimming’s 44-year history at The World Games.
Nine TWG records have been broken in the fastest events of all swimming sports, seven of those set in Chengdu are world record times.
Whilst athletes such as Surface swimmer Nandor KISS (HUN) and Szymon Antoni Kropidlowski (POL) from the Bi Fin discipline deservedly etch their names into history, there have been two Ukrainian athletes charting their own remarkable journey through the highest level of Finswimming.
One of those is 24-year-old Oleksii Zakharov whose swimming style in the pool makes it out as if he glides through the lane, embodying the very creature he once likened himself to.
“When I swim, I feel human, but my movements remind me of a dolphin,” said the IWGA’s athlete of the month in September 2023.
Without one in The World Games Birmingham 2022, Zakharov has left Chengdu with three silver medals following the Men’s Surface 400 m (2:57.03, behind Kiss) and Surface Relay 4x50m on 10 August and then the Surface Relay 4x100 m last night.
His dream had always been to shatter the world record to which he achieved in March 2021 at 20, breaking the 400 m surface mark with a time of 2:55.57.
It was a record that lasted nearly an astounding four years before Kiss’ initial 2:54.64 break at the TWG series in March, now 2:52.68.
Not resting on any laurels however, Zakharov remains driven: “Beating the world record was my dream. I hoped that my record would last until the end of my career, and now I wish to break it again.”
Zakharov’s rise has not been without obstacles. He burst onto the scene not long before the COVID-19 pandemic with training turning from regular into sporadic.
Yet, by 2023 he had returned to peak form, winning gold in the Open Water Surface 150 m at the World Championships in Belgrade.
Although the summit of a podium has eluded him in Chengdu, Zakharov has still added a triple of podiums to his résumé and the fight within him remains unbowed.
Their youthfulness and quality suggests he and Kiss (a 20 year old) will be going tit for tat in years to come including the thirteenth edition of The World Games at Karlsruhe 2029.
Meanwhile, Sofiia Hrechko, born in Kharkiv (UKR) in 2005, has become synonymous with grace under pressure.
Since being inspired by her older sister to take up Finswimming, she has developed a quiet, steady determination that has taken her from junior world champion to a star on the senior circuit.
Her résumé is even more glittering than her male counterpart’s: She holds multiple world titles indoors and on the open water across numerous distances, racking up medals from the 2022 World Championships in Cali and the 2024 Worlds in Budapest, all before arriving in China this week.
Here in Chengdu, she has added a further four to her medal collection, getting gold in the Women’s Surface 200 m and 400 m Finals, and bronze in the Women’s Surface Relay 4×100 m and 4x50 m —her calm composure as telling as her strokes.
“I’m very proud of my achievements, but I’m a simple person,” she replied when asked whether her privileges in the pool have sunk in yet. “When I win, I celebrate in the moment, then I know I need to keep working.”
That is simply the humility belonging to a natural-born champion.
In those tense moments before competition, Hrechko retreats into solitude, listening to music, praying, and cultivating focus within what she called a protective “bubble”. A calm person outside of competition yes but when the starting horn sounds, her pace tells its own story.
What we see in Zakharov is the relentless pursuit of speed, the hunt to reclaim his world record that has not only sculpted his physical drive underwater but also mental fortitude.
Meanwhile Hrechko represents the quiet power of progression: a young athlete whose grounding in family, humility, and solidarity fuels not just her performance, but her resilience.
Together at The World Games 2025, they stood on different podiums but shared a singular mission—to ride, like dolphins in Zakharov’s case, the currents of champions and forge legacy for Ukrainian Finswimming.