Douglas gives USA first Gold at Fukuoka

Australia leads at medal tally at Swimming World Championship,2023, Fukuoka Japan. Australia Grabbed 4 gold medals at first gold medal on the first day. while China clinched gold at the Male 100 Breast male and 100 M Butterfly Female event on the second day. Monday USA won the first gold medal in Female 200 IM. Kate Douglas won gold with 2:07.17 and defending champions Alex Walsh settled for silver with 2:07.97. Chinese swimmer Yu Yiting settled for bronze with 2:08.74.

Earlier Qin Haiyang from China won gold in Male 100 Breast with an Asian record time of 57.69 seconds. Nicolo Martinenghi from Italy, Nic Fink from the USA, and Arno Kamminga From the Netherlands tied for the silver medal with 58.72 seconds.

In Women 100 Butterfly Zhang Yufei of China secured gold with 56.12 seconds. Olympic champion Maggie MacNeil from Canada settled for silver with  56.45 seconds and of form Tori Huske ( USA) complete the podium with 56.61.

Thomas Ceccon had a strong start here in the 50-fly final, which he used to power himself to gold and a new Italian record of 22.68.

Portugal’s Diogo Ribeiro broke out for silver, earning his first senior Worlds medal. On the way to that medal, he went faster than his world junior record by .16 seconds, dropping all the way down to 22.80. However, per World Aquatics’ new rules, the governing body now recognizes world junior records aged 14-18 as of December 31st in the year the race was swum. Ribeiro turns 19 this year, so the world junior record stays at 22.96.

Nevertheless, it’s still a Portuguese record for Ribeiro, who earned bronze in this event at the 2022 European Championships.

After leading the way through the heats and semifinals, Maxime Grousset earned bronze in the final. Grousset touched in 22.82, a tenth off the new French record he swam in the semifinals.