Luong Jeremie and Ho Chi Minh City swimming team regain glory

The 2024 National Swimming Championship took place in Da Nang City from October 10 to 15 with 19 teams and more than 100 athletes from all over the country. The Ho Chi Minh City swimming team ranked first overall with an impressive achievement: 15 gold medals, 9 silver medals and 9 bronze medals. This achievement marked the spectacular return of the city's swimming, regaining the highest position in the Vietnamese swimming community, breaking the national record 4 times, including the mark of overseas Vietnamese athlete Luong Jeremie.

The Ho Chi Minh City swimming team, under the leadership and innovative direction of Mr. Nguyen Nam Nhan - Deputy Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Culture and Sports, is making an impressive transformation. In this tournament, the Ho Chi Minh City team brought 16 athletes (11 men and 5 women), including French-Vietnamese swimmer Luong Jeremie, who contributed significantly to the overall success. He has an outstanding height of 1.95 m.

Luong Jeremie (full name Luong Jeremie Loic Nino) has a French father and a Vietnamese mother. Since 2010, the swimmer born in 2000 moved to Vietnam with his family, began pursuing his passion for swimming, trained at the Ho Chi Minh City swimming team at Yet Kieu Aquatic Sports Center and joined the Vietnam swimming team in 2018.

Trained from a young age, with an extremely ideal height (1.95 m), Luong Jedemie possesses a long arm span that gives him many advantages in competitions, especially since he studied swimming with coach Mathieu Burban in Rennes in 2020.

At the 31st SEA Games held at home, Luong Jeremie won a gold medal in the 4 x 100 m freestyle, a silver medal in the 4 x 100 m medley, a silver medal in the 100 m freestyle and a bronze medal in the 50 m freestyle. At the 32nd SEA Games in Cambodia, he won 3 bronze medals.

At the 2024 National Swimming Championship, Luong Jeremie won the gold medal in the men's 100m freestyle (50 seconds 43), the gold medal in the men's 50m freestyle (23 seconds 27), and the silver medal in the men's 50m butterfly (24 seconds 41).

In addition, the Ho Chi Minh City swimming team also has other excellent athletes such as Tran Duy Khoi (gold medal in men's 50m backstroke - 26 seconds 15, gold medal in men's 100m backstroke - 56 seconds 68); Nguyen Diep Phuong Tram (gold medal in women's 50m butterfly - 27 seconds 67; gold medal in women's 50m backstroke - 29 seconds 61, gold medal in women's 100m backstroke - 1 minute 03 seconds 95), bronze medal in women's 100m freestyle, silver medal in women's 50m freestyle, bronze medal in women's 100m butterfly

Together with Luong Jeremi, they contributed to creating memorable achievements for the Ho Chi Minh City swimming team, with a total of 8 individual gold medals, in addition to the gold medal in the men's 4 x 100m freestyle relay (Bui Gia Hoang, Trinh Truong Vinh, Tran Duy Khoi, Luong Jeremie - 3 minutes 28 seconds 09), especially the gold medal and breaking the national record in the 4 x 100m medley (Tran Duy Khoi, Vu Thi Phuong Anh, Nguyen Diep Phuong Tram, Luong Jeremie - 4 minutes 02 seconds 11).

The next generation shines

A notable highlight of this year's season is the appearance of young athlete Nguyen Kha Nhi, only 16 years old but won the first individual gold medal of her career, in the women's 200m freestyle (2 minutes 04 seconds 99). Besides, she also won a silver medal in the women's 800m freestyle (9 minutes 11 seconds 79), and a silver medal in the women's 1500m freestyle.

The young female swimmer contributed to the success of the women's relay team, along with teammates Vu Thi Phuong Anh, Vu Thi Phuong Anh, Nguyen Ngoc Thuy Tien and Nguyen Diep Phuong Tram.

The squad won all three women's relay events, breaking the national record for the 4 x 100m medley with an impressive time of 4 minutes 17 seconds 63, beating the old record of 4 minutes 20 seconds 32 by nearly 3 seconds that had stood for 5 years since 2019.

In addition, they also won the gold medal in the 4 x 100 m freestyle event after 6 years of absence from the podium, breaking the national record with a time of 3 minutes 53 seconds 25. Kha Nhi also won the gold medal with Bui Gia Hoang, Luong Jeremic, and Nguyen Phuong Tram and broke the national record in the 4 x 100 m freestyle event (3 minutes 36 seconds 39).

The attention and investment of the leaders of the Department of Culture and Sports of Ho Chi Minh City has created a driving force and a solid foundation for the development of Ho Chi Minh City swimming. The success of the swimming team is not only limited to national tournaments but also comes from the foundation of youth tournaments, where the Ho Chi Minh City team also won first place overall.

These successes are the premise for Ho Chi Minh City swimming to aim for the 10th National Sports Festival in 2026, which will be held at home. Hopefully, with strong progress, Ho Chi Minh City swimming team will continue to affirm its position and mark the return of the golden age, making Vietnamese swimming famous in the regional and international arena.