The veteran Brazilian swimmer Nicola Santos He “sneaked” into the Australian party that is becoming the Short Course World Championships taking place in Melbourne, after revalidating the title of 50m butterfly champion at 42 years and 10 months. A feat that cannot hide the overwhelming domination of the local representatives, who after two days of competition recorded a total of five gold medals, after the victories collected this Wednesday in the 800 freestyle, 100 backstroke and 4×200, the latter with a new world record. .world included.

Successes that the young person embodies like no one else Lani Pallister, aged just 20, who won her third world championship title at the Melbourne Aquatic Center, after adding to her victory in the 400m freestyle the victories collected today in the finals of the 800m and the long relay. Absent from American Katie Ledecky and Chinese Bingjie Li, who forfeited after testing positive for coronavirus, the ocean swimmer does not seem to have a rival in long distance tests. As evidenced by the more than six seconds -6.34- in which Pallister, who won with a time of 8:04.7 minutes, passed her closest rival, New Zealand’s Erika Faithweather, in the 800 freestyle final.

But Pallister, who is chasing another gold medal in the 1500m, is not only an excellent distance runner, but has also shown she has the speed to make a decisive contribution to the new world record – 7:30.87- who Australia established in the 4×200 relay. Performances that confirm Lani Pallister’s return to the forefront of world swimming, after overcoming heart problems and the eating disorder she suffered from last year and which cast doubts, as she herself has admitted, its continuity at the highest level.

The one who has never left the star is the Brazilian veteran Nicholas Santos, who twenty years after his debut at the World Short Course Championships, revalidated at the age of 42 years and 10 months the title of universal champion of the 50 butterfly which he won. last year in Abu Dhabi. A victory that acquires even more value if possible thanks to the sensational time with which the Brazilian won his fourth gold medal in the distance, after winning with a time of 21.78 seconds, a new championship record, which did not left only 3 hundredths behind his own world. record (21.75). Nicholas Santos, who turns 43 next February, set his fastest terminal speed to overtake Switzerland’s Noe Ponti, twenty-one years his junior, who had to settle for the silver medal with a record 21, 96 seconds.

RYAN MURPHY LEADS THE AMERICAN RESISTANCE

While Australia top the medal table with five golds, Team USA have more metals than anyone else’s, eleven, thanks to performances by stars like ryan murphy, who climbed this Wednesday up to twice on the top step of the podium. After making a decisive contribution to the North American victory in the mixed 4×50 medley relay final, in which the North American swimmers set a new world record with a time of 1:35.15 minutes, Murphy won another gold medal in the 100 backstroke.

Dominating from the start, Murphy took victory with a time of 48.50 seconds, the second fastest world record of all time, after the world record -48.33- set by his compatriot Coleman Stewart the last year in Naples.

KAYLEE McKEOWN QUEENS IN HUM BACK

The Aussie didn’t come close either kaylee mckeown, who after being crowned Olympic champion in the 100m backstroke last year in one of the most spectacular finals of the Tokyo Games, clinched gold in the hectometre final on Wednesday with a time of 55 .49 seconds. A victory that Mckeown could only consolidate in the last meters after beating her compatriot Mollie O’Callaghan, another of the names of these World Cups, who faced the last 25 meters in first position.

For his part, the Canadian Maggie McNeil and the American Torri Huske they shared the gold medal in the 50m butterfly after posting an identical time of 24.64 seconds, in a final where the Canadian went from eighth and last place to first in the last length.