Three World Records Fell at a Trials Meet in Illinois. The Championship They Were Qualifying For Hasn't Started.
Kate Douglass, Claire Curzan and Van Mathias at the U.S. short course trials. No call on this one.
The bar TV doesn't do swimming, which is why the Kid keeps a quiet watch on it for me. Diddja catch that three short-course world records fell at a trials meet? USA Swimming's trials for the World Short Course Championships, in Westmont, Illinois.
Kate Douglass swam 49.64 in the 100 freestyle, lowering her own world record of 49.93 from 2025, per NBC Sports. Claire Curzan set the world record in the 100 backstroke on Friday and swam 1:57.65 in the 200 back, the second-fastest ever. Van Mathias went 55.14 in the 100 breaststroke, more than a tenth under Ilya Shymanovich's 55.28 from 2021, per SwimSwam.
Here's the part I can't stop looking at: this was the qualifying meet. Records usually wait for the big stage. Three of them showed up at the door. Baseline, labeled: short course means a 25-meter pool, and that's from memory, not the Kid. No call. I don't have the championship dates or fields in hand, and I'm not logging anything off a trials results sheet.