Leon Marchand and Kate Douglass are king and queen of Swimming World Cup

SINGAPORE – In 11 events across China, South Korea and Singapore, Kate Douglass was peerless throughout her maiden short-course World Aquatics Swimming World Cup.

She won each of her heats and finals, all 22 of them, and deservedly claimed the women’s individual ranking title with 178.5 points at the OCBC Aquatic Centre on Nov 2.

The 22-year-old capped a perfect campaign by winning the women’s 100m freestyle final – in her first time competing in this event at the 2024 World Cup – in an American record of 50.82 seconds, ahead of Hong Kong’s Siobhan Haughey (51.56sec) and Poland’s Katarzyna Wasick (52.04sec).

Douglass, who earned US$100,000 (S$132,600) for her individual title and US$184,000 overall, told The Sunday Times: “It’s been a unique and fun experience, something I’ve never done before. I got to meet a lot of cool people whom I haven’t gotten to spend time with, and this kind of brought the fun back to swimming.

“I didn’t think I would win everything that I swim, but it shows that with the training I’ve been doing, I’m in a really good spot, and I’m looking forward to the (Dec 10-15) short-course world championships.”

Teammate Regan Smith was pipped to the women’s individual ranking title by just 0.1 of a point, but claimed another world record as she won the women’s 200m backstroke in 1min 58.83sec to erase Australian Kaylee McKeown’s 2020 mark of 1:58.94 and collected her second triple crown of the series.

Swimmers earn a US$10,000 triple-crown bonus if they sweep the same event at all three stops of the World Cup, and another US$10,000 for each world record they set. Smith pocketed US$70,000 for finishing second in the women’s individual ranking and US$152,000 overall.

She grimaced at first after seeing that she had narrowly lost the individual title to Douglass, but told ST: “What is really incredible is how amazing we both are at this sport, how much hard work we put into it and what great friends we are.

“We root so hard for each other. Before I raced tonight, she told me to go out there and break the world record and pass her. I love her for that, and she earned that win overall.”

The men’s individual ranking title was a more straightforward affair that was decided after the first event of the night when Frenchman Leon Marchand won the men’s 400m individual medley in 3:58.45 to become the undisputed king of medleys as he notched triple crowns for the discipline over the 100m, 200m and 400m.

Wearing the cap of countryman Florent Manaudou, who had won six medals in four Olympics, the 22-year-old had enough in the tank to put in a bonus men’s 200m freestyle swim and take silver in 1:40.91, in between British triple-crown winner Duncan Scott (1:39.83) and China’s Pan Zhanle (1:41.59).

Marchand’s haul of nine golds and one silver across three stops was enough to land him 175.7 points, 3.8 more than Switzerland’s Noe Ponti.

Four-gold Olympic champion Marchand, who won US$100,000 for his individual title and US$174,000 overall, said: “It was so fun. I’m in a time when I need to launch myself to get a new motivation after the Olympics, and I think this was perfect, to meet new people, new culture, discover new places and race as fast as possible.

“I don’t know if I’m a legend, but I wouldn’t say that. It’s awesome to see people from France showing up today. I got so much support in the last three months. Every time someone asks for a picture, they always say, ‘Thank you, Leon’ and I’m really proud of this.”

Ponti also had cause to cheer as he lowered his men’s 50m butterfly world record by 0.17sec when he won the morning heats in 21.50sec.

He then won the final and a triple crown in 21.64sec, ahead of Dutchman Nyls Korstanje (21.74sec) and Singapore’s Teong Tzen Wei (22.11sec), who clocked a national record 21.98sec in the morning’s heats.

For finishing second in the men’s individual ranking, Ponti claimed US$70,000, taking his overall earnings to US$142,000.

The other triple-crown winners on the final night of World Cup racing were South Africa’s Pieter Coetze (men’s 100m backstroke, 49.36sec) and China’s Tang Qianting (women’s 50m breaststroke, 28.87sec).

There was more drama for the 3,000-strong crowd in the men’s 200m breaststroke, when China’s Qin Haiyang produced a lung-busting last 25m to reel in Dutchman Caspar Corbeau and touch home first, only to be disqualified for an apparent false start.

Corbeau (2:02.33) was then declared the winner, with Australia’s Joshua Yong (2:02.85) and Belarusian Ilya Shymanovich (2:03.90) completing the podium.