Top 10 Greek Swimmers

Greece and water share a relationship as ancient as civilization itself, a seafaring people whose mythology is crowded with sea gods, whose history is defined by the Aegean and Ionian, and whose modern sporting story has only recently produced a generation of swimmers capable of competing for the highest honors in the pool and on the open water. For most of the modern Olympic era Greek swimming operated in the background, producing dedicated athletes who competed honorably without reaching the podium. That changed in meaningful ways across the last two decades, starting with Spyros Gianniotis's extraordinary open water career and culminating in Apostolos Christou's silver medal at the Paris 2024 Games, Greece's first Olympic pool medal in 128 years. A new generation of Greek swimmers is now ranked among the world's best, and the sport is experiencing a genuine golden age in the country for the first time. Please note that the swimmers below are not listed in any particular order. Every athlete on this list has made a significant contribution to the history of Greek swimming.

Spyros Gianniotis

The greatest Greek swimmer in history by any reasonable measure and the man who carried the flag for Greek swimming across an extraordinary career that spanned five consecutive Olympic Games, Spyros Gianniotis is a two-time World Champion in the 10 kilometre open water marathon swim, an Olympic silver medalist, and a figure of such longevity and competitive excellence that he was inducted into the International Marathon Swimming Hall of Fame and named World Open Water Swimmer of the Year in 2011, the first and only Greek swimmer to earn that distinction. Born in Liverpool to Greek parents, Gianniotis represented Greece from the Sydney 2000 Games through Rio 2016, finishing fourth at both the Athens and London Olympics in heartbreaking near misses before finally claiming the silver medal at Copacabana Beach in Rio at the age of 36, finishing just 0.2 seconds behind the gold medalist in one of the most emotional performances in the history of Greek sport. He was named Greek Male Athlete of the Year three consecutive times from 2011 through 2013 and served as president of the Greek Swimming Federation following his retirement in 2016. The defining figure of Greek swimming history.

Apostolos Christou

The backstroke specialist who ended 128 years of Greek Olympic absence from the swimming podium with one of the most thrilling performances of the Paris 2024 Games, Apostolos Christou delivered a silver medal in the 200 metre backstroke that permanently changed the narrative of Greek swimming and announced the country's arrival as a genuine force in elite pool competition. His time of 1:54.82 was a massive personal best that saw him lead the field through the first 150 metres before being caught at the wall by Hungary's Hubert Kos, his silver securing not just a medal but a historic milestone for the sport in Greece. A three-time Olympian who first represented Greece in Rio 2016, Christou holds national records across all backstroke distances and the 100 metre freestyle, won World Championship bronze in the 100 backstroke in Doha in 2024, and continues to dominate Greek swimming domestically while competing at the highest levels internationally. The swimmer who reopened the chapter of Greek pool excellence that had been closed since the very first modern Olympics.

Aristeidis Grigoriadis

The first Greek pool swimmer ever to win a World Championship medal in any event at any international championships, Aristeidis Grigoriadis claimed gold in the 50 metre backstroke at the 2005 World Championships in Montreal to open a landmark chapter in the history of Greek competitive swimming. His victory made him the first Greek swimmer to stand on the World Championship podium and earned him a place in the record books as one of the pioneering figures of the modern Greek swimming movement. He followed that achievement with a European Championship gold in the 50 metre backstroke at Eindhoven in 2008 alongside a silver in the 100 metre backstroke, confirming his status as a genuine European-level specialist and a consistent competitor at the highest levels of the sport. A trailblazer whose 2005 world title remained the benchmark of Greek swimming achievement for nearly two decades until Gkolomeev and Christou began adding to the country's international medal collection.

Kristian Gkolomeev

The sprint freestyle specialist who became Greece's second-ever World Championship medalist in pool swimming and one of the most electrifying short-course sprinters European swimming has produced in recent years, Kristian Gkolomeev was born in Bulgaria to a family with deep swimming roots, his father having been an Olympic swimmer for Bulgaria in 1980 and 1988, before growing up in Greece and representing the country across three Olympic Games. He won silver in the 50 metre freestyle at the 2019 World Championships in Gwangju, sharing second place with Brazil's Bruno Fratus behind Caeleb Dressel, and reached the final of the 50 freestyle at both the Tokyo 2020 and Paris 2024 Games, finishing fifth on both occasions in the world's most competitive sprint event. A University of Alabama NCAA champion who brought international credibility and elite-level sprint credentials to Greek swimming during a period when the sport was still finding its footing, Gkolomeev's career was central to raising awareness of Greek competitive swimming across the global swimming community.

Anna Ntountounaki

The most accomplished Greek female pool swimmer in the modern era and the first Greek woman to win a gold medal at a European Aquatics Championship in swimming, Anna Ntountounaki has spent the better part of a decade as the standard-bearer for women's Greek pool swimming, competing as a specialist in the 100 and 50 metre butterfly with consistency and distinction across three Olympic Games. Her gold medal at the 2021 European Aquatics Championships in Budapest, shared with France's Marie Wattel in a time of 57.37, was a landmark moment for Greek women's swimming that no athlete from her country had previously achieved at that level of competition. A three-time Olympian who finished ninth in the 100 butterfly in Tokyo and reached the Paris 2024 Games at the age of 28, Ntountounaki continues to set national records and ranked seventh in the world in the 50 metre butterfly in 2025 with a career best of 25.63. A pioneering figure whose consistency across the better part of a decade has kept Greece represented in elite women's butterfly swimming.

Apostolos Siskos

The most exciting emerging talent in Greek swimming and a 200 metre backstroke specialist who ranked first in the world in the event in 2025 with a Greek national record of 1:54.66, Apostolos Siskos represents the clearest evidence that Greek swimming's golden era is not limited to the achievements of Gianniotis and Christou but is being carried forward by a genuinely world-class generation. Still a teenager at his first Olympic Games in Paris 2024, Siskos arrived at those Games as the European Championships silver medalist in the 200 backstroke and followed his Olympic experience by setting the Greek national record and ranking first globally in the event in May 2025. Born and raised in Serres and trained in Thessaloniki before attending Harvard University, Siskos brings an unusual combination of elite academic and athletic credentials to the sport. A swimmer who may well become the most decorated Greek pool swimmer in history before his career is complete, Siskos is the face of what comes next for Greek swimming.

Stergios Bilas

One of the most electrifying sprint talents to emerge from Greek swimming in the modern era and a European champion in the 50 metre butterfly whose raw speed and competitive youth have made him one of the most exciting young sprinters in European aquatics, Stergios Bilas announced his arrival at the highest level with a European Championship gold in the 50 butterfly in Belgrade in 2024 that placed him firmly in the conversation of the continent's elite sprint specialists. He also won silver in the 50 freestyle at those same championships and posted a personal best of 23.06 in the butterfly semi-finals that established his credentials as a genuinely world-class short-course performer. A regular member of the Greek national team at major international competitions and still improving rapidly at an age that places him at the beginning rather than the peak of his career, Bilas is one of the brightest names in the generation of Greek swimmers that is reshaping the country's international swimming identity from the ground up.

Georgia Damasioti

One of the most promising butterfly specialists in the rapidly emerging new generation of Greek swimming talent and a swimmer whose 2024 European Championship performances signaled that Anna Ntountounaki will have a genuine successor in the 100 and 200 butterfly events, Georgia Damasioti won silver in the 100 butterfly at the 2024 European Aquatics Championships in Belgrade and gold at the 2025 European U-23 Championships, demonstrating the kind of consistent championship-level performance across age groups and senior competition that marks her as a swimmer with genuine elite potential. Still only 21 years old and already posting times in the 100 butterfly that have established her as a senior World Championship qualifier and a regular competitor at events where she is challenging established European names, Damasioti is central to the story of how Greek women's swimming is developing its next generation of international performers and building depth behind Ntountounaki in the butterfly disciplines.

Nery Mantey

One of the most underappreciated figures in the history of Greek women's swimming and the only Greek woman other than Ntountounaki to win a medal at a European Aquatics Championship in pool swimming, Nery Mantey won bronze in the 100 metre freestyle at the 2004 and 2006 European Championships and bronze in the 50 metre freestyle at the 2012 European Championships, a remarkable record of consistency in sprint freestyle events that spanned nearly a decade of competitive swimming at the European level. Her three European Championship bronze medals from three separate editions of the competition make her statistically one of the most decorated Greek female pool swimmers in the history of the European Championships and a figure whose contribution to Greek women's swimming often goes unacknowledged in the broader story of the sport's development in the country. A genuine and consistent European-level performer whose bronze medal record in freestyle sprinting has never been matched by another Greek woman.

Vangelis Makrygiannis

One of the most accomplished and internationally competitive backstroke specialists in the current generation of Greek swimming and a consistent presence at European and World Championship level who finished eighth in the 100 metre backstroke at the 2024 European Championships in Belgrade while also contributing to national relay records, Vangelis Makrygiannis has been a dependable and technically accomplished member of the Greek national swimming team across multiple major championship cycles. A regular finalist at European Championship level in the 100 metre backstroke, Makrygiannis represents the kind of depth and breadth of backstroke talent that Greece has developed in recent years, competing alongside Christou and Siskos in a national backstroke program that now produces multiple swimmers capable of competing credibly at the highest levels of European competition. His continued presence at major international events and his contributions to relay performances make him one of the key building blocks of the Greek swimming program's current strength and future ambition.

Conclusion

Greek swimming has traveled an extraordinary distance in a relatively short period of time, from a sport that produced virtually no international medalists across more than a century of competition to a program that in 2024 placed second in the European Championship medal table with 17 medals and delivered Greece's first Olympic pool medal since 1896. The athletes on this list span the pioneering open water excellence of Spyros Gianniotis, the landmark world championship breakthroughs of Grigoriadis and Gkolomeev, the historic Paris silver of Apostolos Christou, and the extraordinary emerging generation of Siskos, Bilas, Damasioti, and Ntountounaki that is making Greek swimming competitive at a level the sport in Greece has never previously approached. The water that surrounds Greece has always been a birthplace of legends. It is only now beginning to produce them in competitive swimming as well.