Olympic Swimming Trials: McIntosh secures fourth victory, Knox and Liendo break national records
As the Olympic and Paralympic Swimming Trials, Presented by Bell, near their end, anticipation mounts with just one more day of competition left following the two national records and three Olympic qualifications secured Saturday night at the Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre.
Emerging victorious once again, Summer McIntosh clinched gold in the 200m butterfly. McIntosh jumped out to take the lead before stopping the clock in two minutes and 4.33 seconds, to stay under the Olympic Qualifying Time of 2:08.43.
This marks the fourth event in which the Toronto native has gone under qualifying time at the trials.
Her dominance has been seen throughout the week. On Monday, she claimed victory in the 400m freestyle, followed by a comfortable win in the 200m freestyle the next night. Not content with that, MacIntosh broke her world record in the 400 individual medley on Thursday.
“It’s so exciting, my last Olympics I just did freestyle events,” McIntosh said. “So being able to come back to doing my favourite events which is more IM [and] fly-based, along with every style still, is really fun just to kind of see how to balance all of it together.”
McIntosh won gold in both the 200 butterfly and 400 IM at the 2023 World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka, Japan.
READ: Olympic Swimming Trials: New world record for McIntosh
There were two Canadian records set in the men’s events with a pair of Olympic qualifications.
Finlay Knox clinched the top spot in the men’s 200m individual medley final. Knox, who became the world champion in the distance back in February, broke his own record of 1:56.64. Stopping the clock in 1:56.07 on Sunday, he secured his first individual qualification for Paris 2024.
“Tonight’s a big win, winning the world championship was a big win and just using it as a fuel to the fire and every time I step out now, knowing what I’m capable of doing.”
Following swiftly, Joshua Liendo made quick work of the men’s 50m freestyle final. Liendo broke his mark of 21.61 from 2022 with a new time of 21.48 seconds. The 21-year-old had already gone under the Olympic qualifying time of 21.96 with a 21.72 second showing in preliminaries earlier on Saturday.
This marks his second event qualification for Paris 2024, following his success in the 100 freestyle earlier this week. Additionally, he is set to compete in the 100 butterfly, an event where he secured a silver medal at the 2023 World Championships.
“It feels good, those are my main events,” Liendo said. “It feels good to be able to go fast in them and execute things the way I want to because, obviously, I’m gonna have to execute really well come the Olympic Games.”
READ: Olympic Swimming Trials: Oleksiak books her ticket to Paris, Tierney breaks national record
Julia Strojnowska won the women’s 800 freestyle with a time of 8:38.36. However, the Olympic Qualifying Time for the event stood at 8:26.71.
The Olympic and Paralympic Swimming Trials, Presented by Bell, will continue until Sunday at the Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre. Preliminary heats begin at 9:30 a.m. ET each day, with the finals sessions starting at 6:00 p.m. each evening. It all leads up to the official announcement of Team Canada’s Paris 2024 swimming team on Sunday night.
All competition sessions are being streamed live on CBC Sports digital platforms (CBC Gem, cbcsports.ca, CBC Sports app). There is also a nightly highlight show on CBC TV.
