BUDAPEST: The assault on short-course swimming world records continued Saturday as Gretchen Walsh added two more to take her tally for the week to eight, while Jordan Crooks broke one record twice in the day and Summer McIntosh claimed a third and Noe Ponti a second mark of the week.

By the middle of the evening on the fifth day of the World Championships in Budapest, 24 records had fallen. Each record brings a 25,000 dollar (23,800 euro) bonus cheque from World Aquatics.

“It’s definitely payday, or rather pay-week I guess,” Walsh had said the night before, after setting three records.

The 21-year-old American opened Saturday’s evening session by breaking the 100m butterfly world recordfor the second time in two days. On Friday the morning the record was 54.05 seconds set by Canadian Maggie Mac Neil in 2022.

In the heats, Walsh became the first woman under 54 seconds and then in the final the first under 53sec as she won in 52.71sec.

Walsh returned to water less than an hour later to swim 22.87 in 50m freestyle semifinal to break the record of 22.93 set in 2017 by Dutch swimmer Ranomi Kromowidjojo.

In between, Swiss swimmer Ponti claimed his third title and second record of the week when he won the men’s 100m fly in 47.71 to shave 0.07sec of the record American Caleb Dressel sent in the same pool in 2020.

Canadian McIntosh then smashed the women’s 400 individual medley in 4 minutes 15.48 seconds, more than three seconds inside the 2017 mark of 4:18.94 by Spaniard Mireia Belmonte.

Jordan Crooks, representing the Cayman Islands, also broke a record set by Dressel in Budapest in 2020 in the 50m free and then broke it again for good measure. Dressel’s mark was 20.16 and Crooks swum 20.08 in the morning heats and then became the first swimmer under 20 seconds in 19.90 in the evening semi-finals.

Published in Dawn, December 16th, 2024