Photo: AFP
Canadian teen sensation Summer McIntosh is coming for American legend Katie Ledecky's crown as the swimming portion of the World Aquatics Championships kicks off in Singapore on Sunday, marking a tantalising new chapter of their rivalry.
Ledecky has kept a tight grip on the 800 metres freestyle, winning four Olympic golds and hoping to become the first swimmer to win seven world titles in a single event when she takes on the distance in Singapore.
In May, she shattered her own world record, bettering the mark she set nine years previous.
"I've always approached each race with a mindset that something like that could happen," Ledecky told the outlet SwimSwam after the race.
"Even as that didn't happen for many, many years, I still maintain that approach."
Only the 18-year-old McIntosh appears capable of standing in her path at worlds. She came within two seconds of the 28-year-old American's mark last month, signalling the chance that fans could soon see a changing of the guard.
She famously ended Ledecky's 13-year unbeaten streak in the event in 2024, when she bested the American by nearly six seconds at a sectionals meeting in Orlando, Florida.
"Anytime I get to race Katie, it's a learning experience and it's always a good race," she told reporters this month. "We bring the best out of each other."
McIntosh completed one of the greatest weeks in swimming history with a hat-trick of world records in June, becoming the first to break three different individual long-course records in one meet since American Michael Phelps in 2008.
She broke the world marks in the 200m and 400m individual medleys, as well as the 400m freestyle, another event where she will face off against Ledecky in Singapore.
The 400m is one of the first events on the programme and also features New Zealander Erika Fairweather - a gold medallist last year in Doha when she clocked a national record time, although her main rivals weren't competing.
Dunedin swimmer Erika Fairweather Photo: Simon Watts BW Media
McIntosh and Ledecky finished second and third on the podium, respectively, in the 400m at the Paris Olympic Games, behind Australian Ariarne Titmus, who is not competing at worlds.
McIntosh's goal in Singapore is to become the first since Phelps in 2007 to win five solo golds at a single World Aquatics Championships, with the 200m butterfly, 200m medley and 400m freestyle also on her agenda.
She hopes to compete in five individual events at the Los Angeles 2028 Games, as well.
"I'm trying to see this new challenge and see if I can do five events individually and how well I can do in them and how I can manage it... doing that run through now, three years out, is definitely something that will give me lots of confidence," she said.
Marchand back after Olympic heroics
Leon Marchand will be swimming a reduced programme but the home hero of last year's Paris Olympics still intends to make a splash at the world championships.
Leon Marchand from France wins the final of the men’s 400m individual medley at the Paris Olympics. Photo: photosport
A year on from those Games, Europe's standout swimmer has dropped two of his four Olympic gold medal events to focus on the 200 and 400 metres individual medley (IM) with some possible relay action.
With the next Los Angeles Games still three years away, the 23-year-old can take the luxury of racing the 200m without restraint.
Having no races immediately before or after on the same day, the Frenchman can push to the limit and that could mean fireworks.
As the swimmer's France-based coach Nicolas Castel observed this week, Marchand wanted to "see what he was capable of".
The world already has a good idea of that: Last November Marchand broke the 200 IM short-course world record at a meet in Singapore and he can become a three-times world champion in the 200 and 400 IM after golds in both in 2022 and 2023.
The 200 IM long course world record of 1:54.00 was set by American Ryan Lochte at the 2011 championships in Shanghai and Marchand clocked 1:54.06 in Paris.
The Frenchman has held the 400 IM world record of 4:02.50 since the 2023 Fukuoka worlds in Japan and can become the first man to hold both at the same time since U.S. great Michael Phelps.
Olympic champions David Popovici (200m freestyle) of Romania, Ireland's Daniel Wiffen (800m freestyle), Germany's Lukas Maertens (400m freestyle) and Italian Thomas Ceccon (100m backstroke) will also be chasing more gold.
Wiffen, reigning world champion in the 800 and 1500 freestyle, has said he wants Zhang Lin's 800m world record of 7:32.12 that was set in the era of now-banned super-suits in Rome in 2009 and is considered by many to be out of reach now.
- Reuters
