Irakli Bolkvadze
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| Personal information | |||||||||||||||
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Nickname(s) | Ika, Bolkva | ||||||||||||||
| Nationality |  Georgia | ||||||||||||||
| Born | 12 December 1994 | ||||||||||||||
| Height | 1.83 m (6 ft 0 in) | ||||||||||||||
| Weight | 73 kg (161 lb) | ||||||||||||||
| Sport | |||||||||||||||
| Sport | Swimming | ||||||||||||||
| Strokes | Breaststroke, medley | ||||||||||||||
| Club | Hamilton Aquatics Dubai | ||||||||||||||
| Coach | Georgi Abzianidze Irina Minjulina Chris Tidey[1] | ||||||||||||||
Medal record
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Irakli Bolkvadze (Georgian: ირაკლი ბოლქვაძე; born December 12, 1994, in Nicosia, Cyprus) is a Georgian swimmer, who specialized in breaststroke and individual medley events.[1][2] He won a bronze medal in the boys' 200 m breaststroke at the 2012 European Junior Swimming Championships in Antwerp, Belgium with a time of 2:15.46.[3] Bolkvadze is also trained by his personal coach Irina Minjulina.
Bolkvadze qualified for the men's 200 m breaststroke at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London by breaking a new Georgian record and eclipsing a FINA B-standard entry time of 2:16.35 from the European Championships in Debrecen, Hungary.[4][5] In Georgia's Olympic history, he also became the first ever swimmer to surpass an invitation time set by FINA.[6] He dominated the first heat by two seconds ahead of Kyrgyzstan's Dmitrii Aleksandrov, lowering his Georgian record time to 2:15.86. Bolkvadze failed to advance into the semifinals, as he placed twenty-eighth overall in the preliminary heats.[7]
At the 2013 FINA World Championships in Barcelona, Bolkvadze demolished a new Georgian record of 2:03.55 in the 200 m individual medley, but finished thirty-fifth from the morning prelims.[8][9] Bolkvadze is currently a member of Hamilton Aquatics Club in Dubai, United Arab Emirates under head coach Chris Tidey.