Mahrez Mebarek (Arabic: محرز مبارك; born February 11, 1985) is an Algerian former swimmer, who specialized in freestyle events.[1] He is a multiple-time Algerian record holder in long-distance freestyle (400, 800, and 1500 m).
Mebarek made his official debut at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, where he qualified for two swimming events. In the 400 m freestyle, he challenged seven other swimmers on the third heat, where South Korea's Park Tae-Hwan was disqualified for a false start. Mebarek edged out Slovenia's Bojan Zdešar to take a fourth spot and dip under a 4-minute barrier by 0.90 of a second in 3:59.10.[2][3] In his second event, 200 m freestyle, Mebarek shared a thirty-fifth place tie with Macedonia's Aleksandar Malenko in the preliminaries with a time of 1:53.00.[4][5]
At the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, Mebarek qualified for the second time in the men's 200 m freestyle by eclipsing a FINA B-standard entry time of 1:52.03 from the EDF Swimming Open in Paris, France.[6][7] He challenged six other swimmers on the second heat, including four-time Olympian Andrei Zaharov of Moldova. He edged out Kazakhstan's Artur Dilman to take a third spot by 0.24 of a second, posting his lifetime best of 1:52.66. Mebarek failed to advance into the semifinals, as he placed fifty-first overall in the preliminaries.[8]
