Swimming at the 1973 World Aquatics Championships – Men's 200 metre individual medley
# Swimming at the 1973 World Aquatics Championships – Men's 200 metre individual medley

The men's 200 metre individual medley competition of the swimming events at the 1973 World Aquatics Championships took place on September 7.

## Records

Prior to the competition, the existing world and championship records were as follows.

| World record | Gunnar Larsson (SWE) | 2:07.17 | Munich, West Germany | 3 September 1972 |
| - | - | - | - | - |
| Competition record | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A |

The following records were established during the competition:

| Date | Event | Name | Nationality | Time | Record |
| - | - | - | - | - | - |
| 7 September | Heat 1 | András Hargitay | Hungary | 2:09.54 | CR |
| 7 September | Final | Gunnar Larsson | Sweden | 2:08.36 | CR |

## Results

### Heats

28 swimmers participated in 5 heats, qualified swimmers are listed:

| Rank | Heat | Lane | Name | Nationality | Time | Notes |
| - | - | - | - | - | - | - |
| 1 | 1 | - | András Hargitay | Hungary | 2:09.54 | Q, CR |
| 2 | 3 | - | David Wilkie | Great Britain | 2:09.61 | Q, CWR |
| 3 | 1 | - | Christian Lietzmann | East Germany | 2:09.91 | Q |
| 4 | 5 | - | Gunnar Larsson | Sweden | 2:10.13 | Q |
| 5 | 4 | - | Stan Carper | United States | 2:11.04 | Q |
| 6 | 3 | - | Sergey Zakharov | Soviet Union | 2:11.07 | Q |
| 7 | 2 | - | Fred Tyler | United States | 2:11.31 | Q |
| 8 | 5 | - | Wolfram Sperling | East Germany | 2:11.46 | Q |
| 9 | 2 | - | Andrey Smirnov | Soviet Union | 2:11.98 | |
| 10 | 3 | - | Zoltán Verrasztó | Hungary | 2:12.65 | |
| 11 | 4 | - | Brian Brinkley | Great Britain | 2:14.31 | |
| 12 | 5 | - | David Brumwell | Canada | 2:14.99 | |
| 13 | 3 | - | Nigel Cluer | Papua New Guinea | 2:15.90 | |
| 14 | 5 | - | Tsuyoshi Yanagidate | Japan | 2:16.01 | |
| 15 | 2 | - | Steve Badger | Australia | 2:16.42 | |
| 16 | 4 | - | Jorge Delgado | Ecuador | 2:16.47 | |
| 17 | 2 | - | Eduardo Orejuela | Ecuador | 2:16.58 | |
| 18 | 5 | - | Neil Martin | Australia | 2:17.01 | |
| 19 | 3 | - | Ignacio Álvarez | Mexico | 2:17.05 | |
| 20 | 4 | - | Antônio Azevedo | Brazil | 2:17.25 | |
| 21 | 2 | - | Gunnar Gundersen | Norway | 2:19.07 | |
| 22 | 1 | - | Peter Tetlow | Australia | 2:19.71 | |
| 23 | 3 | - | Ramón Volcán | Venezuela | 2:20.84 | |
| 24 | 1 | - | Carlos Santiago | Puerto Rico | 2:21.11 | |
| 25 | 2 | - | Jorge Jaramillo | Colombia | 2:21.39 | |
| 26 | 3 | - | Helmut Podolan | Austria | 2:21.72 | |
| 27 | 1 | - | Ali Gharbi | Tunisia | 2:22.62 | |
| 28 | 4 | - | C. Manochehr | Iran | 2:38.93 | |
| – | 4 | - | Patrick Moreau | France | Did not start | Did not start |
| – | 5 | - | Michael Weiss | West Germany | Did not start | Did not start |
| – | 1 | - | Bandi Wetternek | Romania | Did not start | Did not start |

### Final

The results of the final are below.

| Rank | Lane | Name | Nationality | Time | Notes |
| - | - | - | - | - | - |
| | 6 | Gunnar Larsson | Sweden | 2:08.36 | CR |
| | 2 | Stan Carper | United States | 2:08.43 | |
| | 5 | David Wilkie | Great Britain | 2:08.84 | CWR |
| 4 | 4 | András Hargitay | Hungary | 2:09.52 | |
| 5 | 3 | Christian Lietzmann | East Germany | 2:09.57 | |
| 6 | 8 | Wolfram Sperling | East Germany | 2:10.54 | |
| 7 | 1 | Fred Tyler | United States | 2:10.86 | |
| 8 | 7 | Sergey Zakharov | Soviet Union | 2:10.86 | |
