What a special night we had on day three at the Budapest swimming World Championships.
We had the first World Record to fall at this meet, the fastest 200m freestyle since 2012,
and more incredible swims. So for this video from Propulsion Swimming let's
get straight into it and give you our day three recap from Budapest.
So we kicked off day three with the Men's 200m freestyle in what turned out to be an
utterly sensational final.
David Popovici went into this one with a World Junior Record in the semi-finals and in the
final he was simply unstoppable. It was Tom Dean who really tried to take the fight to Popovici
turning at the 100m mark in a sub 50 second split, but the Olympic Champion had to settle
for bronze as Popovici was simply indescribable in this one - finishing an incredible 1:43.21.
Honestly this kid at just the age of 17 is something very, very special.
It's the second fastest textile time of all time, behind Yannick Agnel.
A deserved first World Champion title for Popovici and there's going to be so many more to come.
Next up we had the Women's 1500m freestyle and of course this was the Katie Ledecky show. There
is still no one in the world who can get anywhere close to the Ledecky standard at
distance swimming. She led this one from start to finish, finishing in a time of 15:30.17,
holding roughly 31 seconds throughout. And with this title, Ledecky now makes it
20 World Championship medals only behind the great Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte. Surely
it's only a matter of time before she overtakes at least one of them.
The first semi-final of day three was the Men's 50m breaststroke and, in all honesty, this one
was a little bit of a disappointment. Times were fairly slow across the board but for most of the
main contenders it's job done and into tomorrow's final. Nicolo Martinenghi will of course go in as
favourite after winning the 100m, but Michael Andrew and Nick Fink are also going to be there
or thereabouts. Perhaps the biggest talking point from the semi-finals was the fact that Brazilian
Gomes Jr was DQ'd thanks to the use of underwater cameras. That's a first for me. How about you?
The Women's 100m backstroke turned out to be a much closer contest than everyone had thought.
After the semi-finals where Regan Smith got so close to that World Record, everyone thought
this was hers for the taking but she wasn't able to deliver quite the same performance,
with Kylie Masse really taking it to her. However, the American did just about manage
to hold on for gold in a time of 58.22. Kylie Masse ends up with the silver for Canada
and Claire Curzan gets another medal on the board for team USA in third.
The Men's 100m backstroke, the race of the night. We have the first World Record of
these World Championships and it's a surprise. Italian Thomas Ceccon continues his incredibly
strong meet and with a time of 51.60, his meteoric rise to the top is confirmed as the new
World Champion and World Record holder. In fact his performance here was so good that he was 0.25
under Ryan Murphy's previous World Record mark. An incredible distance at this
international level. Now, former World Record holder, Ryan Murphy,
had to settle for the silver after just holding off from the charging Hunter Armstrong in third.
Next up in day three was the Women's 200m freestyle semi-finals
and it's Brit Freya Anderson who sets a new personal best and will go into tomorrow's
final as the fastest qualifier. However, with the entire field split by less than the second,
it's going to be an incredibly tight battle tomorrow. Our money is on 17 year old Australian,
Mollie O'Callaghan. She looked incredibly smooth and controlled throughout this one and
there looks to be so much more in the tank for this swimmer with an incredibly bright future.
The Men's 200m butterfly - the event of pain. However home favourite Kristof Milak
consistently makes this look like the most comfortable event on the planet.
And of course he goes into tomorrow's final as a red hot favourite. If anyone were to surpass him,
honestly, that would be the biggest shock of this meet. It's crazy to think he's actually targeting
a sub 1:50 200m fly right now, simply incredible. Behind him however, there's going to be a
much tighter battle for the rest of the podium places. With personal bests littered across both
semi-finals, it looks like all of these swimmers are in great form heading into tomorrow's final.
And we rounded out day three with a highly competitive Women's 100m breaststroke. We
said yesterday it would be a massive shock if Lilly King were to turn around her form
from the semi-finals and get on the podium - well she nearly did - just missing out in fourth place.
However, the podium places go to Ruta Meilutyte, Anna Elendt and new World Champion Benedetta
Pilato. It was brilliant to see the emotion the 50m World Record holder had after claiming her
first world title. This was one of the closest races that we're going to see at these World
Championships, with that top four split by just 0.14 seconds. So that rounds up our day 3 recap
of the Budapest swimming World Championships 2022. The first World Record in the bag and hopefully
there is so many more to come. Make sure you've SUBSCRIBED to the Propulsion Swimming YouTube
channel so you catch our day 4 recap tomorrow. And until then I'll catch you on the next one!