Swimming at the 1972 Summer Olympics – Men's 200 metre breaststroke

The men's 200 metre breaststroke event at the 1972 Olympic Games took place September 2.^[1] This swimming event used the breaststroke. Because an Olympic-size swimming pool is 50 metres long, this race consisted of four lengths of the pool.

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Note
1	Klaus Katzur	East Germany	2:26.32	Q
2	Bill Mahony	Canada	2:26.71
3	Roger-Philippe Menu	France	2:30.05
4	Guðjón Guðmundsson	Iceland	2:32.40
5	Sokhon Yi	Khmer Republic	2:34.77
6	János Tóth	Hungary	2:37.40

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Note
1	Nobutaka Taguchi	Japan	2:23.45	Q
2	Felipe Muñoz	Mexico	2:25.99	Q
3	Pedro Balcells	Spain	2:29.29
4	Robert Stoddart	Canada	2:30.08
5	Cezary Śmiglak	Poland	2:34.51
6	Morkal Faruk	Turkey	2:43.69
7	Piero Ferracuti	El Salvador	2:45.73

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Note
1	David Wilkie	Great Britain	2:24.54	Q
2	Walter Kusch	West Germany	2:26.43	Q
3	Steffen Kriechbaum	Austria	2:30.09
4	Malcolm O'Connell	Great Britain	2:31.21
5	Jean-Pierre Dubey	Switzerland	2:31.56
6	Gustavo Salcedo	Mexico	2:32.81
7	Osvaldo Boretto	Argentina	2:31.84	DSQ

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Note
1	Rick Colella	United States	2:25.40	Q
2	Vladimir Kosinsky	Soviet Union	2:28.00
3	Angel Chakarov	Bulgaria	2:30.27
4	Andreas Hellmann	West Germany	2:32.60
5	Liam Ball	Ireland	2:33.47
6	Nigel Johnson	Great Britain	2:34.37
7	Karl Christian Koch	Denmark	2:38.47

Medalists

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Note
1	Igor Cherdakov	Soviet Union	2:26.21	Q
2	Brian Job	United States	2:26.91
3	José Sylvio Fiolo	Brazil	2:30.21
4	Rainer Hradetzky	East Germany	2:32.48
5	Amman Jaalmani	Philippines	2:33.54
6	Michele Di Pietro	Italy	2:36.49

Rank	Athlete	Country	Time	Note
1	John Hencken	United States	2:24.88	Q
2	Nikolay Pankin	Soviet Union	2:26.71
3	Paul Jarvie	Australia	2:27.83
4	Mike Whitaker	Canada	2:33.47
5	Rudi Vingerhoets	Belgium	2:36.89
6	Gregor Betz	West Germany	2:36.96
7	Alfredo Hunger	Peru	2:37.20
8	Alejandro Cabrera	El Salvador	2:56.60