Ioannis Drymonakos

Ioannis Drymonakos (born 18 January 1984) is a Greek swimmer from Athens. He became the first ever Greek swimmer to hold a European swimming record by clocking a time of 1:54.16 seconds in 200 m butterfly event of the 2008 European Aquatics Championships final on 21 March 2008.

In 2008, a few days before the Beijing Olympic Games he tested positive for banned drugs during a doping-control test.

He was then acquitted of all charges for use of banned substances by the court, that decided it was impossible for him to procure the substance M3 [11]. He came back in 2010 winning the bronze medal at the European Championship in Budapest in the event of 200 m butterfly.

In 2012 he won two more bronze medals at the European Championship in Debrecen. The last race of his career was the semifinal of 200 m butterfly at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, in which he took the 15th place overall.

In 2015, Ioannis Drymonakos participated at the Arena Pro Swim Series at Charlotte by U.S.A swimming during his effort to get to 2016 Summer Olympics and taking the competitive advantage among many distinguished athletes such as Michael Phelps. He competed in Friday’s (May 15) 400 meters Men IM making it in 04:20.26 and breaking his personal record for over 2 seconds to hold the 4th place. On Saturday’s (May 16) 200 meters Men Butterfly made it in 1:59:61 holding the 5th place.