Summer McIntosh comes closer to erasing oldest women’s swimming world record
In yet another awe-inspiring performance, Summer McIntosh came within 0.45 of a second of taking down the oldest women’s swimming world record.
On Tuesday night, McIntosh won the women’s 200m butterfly at the 2025 Bell Canadian Swimming Trials in 2:02.26. That shaved 0.76 off her own Canadian record and is the second fastest time ever in the event. China’s Liu Zige set the world record at 2:01.81 in 2009 during what has been dubbed the “super suit era”, before textiles and suit design became more tightly regulated.
“I think this world record is the hardest one to get,” said McIntosh, who has set two world records and four national records in the first four days of the Trials. “I’m just so happy with the 2:02 low tonight. I didn’t know if that was possible for me.”
McIntosh had been on world record pace when she made her final turn.
“I was kind of upset with myself with the finish,” she said. “My last stroke was just a little bit wonky. I can definitely find the other little deficiencies through the race.
“The fact I’m knocking on the door on that world record is really encouraging. That’s the one world record I never thought I would even come close to. To be pretty close to it is pretty wild.”
McIntosh won Olympic gold in the 200m butterfly at Paris 2024 following her back-to-back world titles in the event in 2022 and 2023. Her winning time in Paris was 2:03.03, which was the previous closest anyone had gotten to erasing Liu’s mark.
Next up for her is the 400m individual medley on Wednesday, in which is also the Olympic champion and a two-time world champion as well as the world record holder. McIntosh broke a 10-year-old world record in the women’s 200m IM on Monday after she reclaimed the world record in the women’s 400m freestyle on Saturday. In between, she came within 0.95 of the world record in the women’s 800m freestyle on Sunday.
Also on Tuesday night, Ilya Kharun earned his second victory of the Trials, winning the men’s 200m butterfly in 1:53.41. Though he won Olympic bronze in the event at Paris 2024, Kharun says he is still learning the race.
“I’m really glad how it’s progressing,” said Kharun. “I think it should be a lot better once we get some more work in.”
Ruslan Gaziev had an emotional moment when he won the men’s 100m freestyle in 48.37 to earn his spot on the team for the World Aquatics Championships. Gaziev is returning to competitive swimming after serving an 18-month suspension for an anti-doping rule violation for failing to keep his whereabouts information up to date.
Antoine Sauve, Josh Liendo, and Filip Senc-Samardzic rounded out the top four and will make up the men’s 4x100m freestyle relay team at the worlds.
Penny Oleksiak won her second event of the Trials, adding the women’s 100m freestyle to her earlier triumph in the 50m freestyle, as she clocked 54:03.
“I think I had a lot more in that race,” said the seven-time Olympic medallist. “I’m excited to get back into training and just getting faster for the summer.”
She’ll be joined on the women’s 4x100m freestyle relay team by Taylor Ruck, Brooklyn Douthwright, and Ingrid Wilm, who finished second, third, and fourth, respectively.
The Bell Canadian Swimming Trials, which continue through Thursday, are serving as the selection meet for the World Aquatics Championships which will take place in Singapore later this summer. The swimming competition at the worlds will be held July 26 to August 3.
You can catch all the action throughout the week. CBC Gem and https://www.cbc.ca/player/sports/live will stream each session beginning at 12:30 p.m. ET/9:30 a.m. PT for heats and 8:30 p.m. ET/5:30 p.m. PT for finals. Every session will also be live on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@CBCSports/streams.
