McIntosh cruises to national record in women's 800m freestyle at Canadian swimming trials

Dion Caputi · CBC Sports

· Posted: Jun 08, 2025 8:10 AM EDT | Last Updated: June 13

Summer McIntosh continued to show dominance astatine nationalist swimming trials successful Victoria connected Sunday.

In beforehand of a loud, inspiring assemblage astatine the Saanich Commonwealth Place pool, McIntosh set a Canadian grounds successful the 800-metre final, finishing successful a clip of 8:05.07.

The 18-year-old from Toronto fell conscionable abbreviated of American Katie Ledecky's 8:04.12 satellite record.

Shaving astir 5 seconds off her erstwhile idiosyncratic best, McIntosh's time stands arsenic the third-fastest women's 800m show successful history.

On Saturday, McIntosh broke the women's 400m freestyle satellite grounds antecedently held by Australian superstar Ariarne Titmus.

WATCH | McIntosh sets national grounds successful 800m freestyle astatine Canadian trials:

"I'm ever shooting to interruption records and propulsion the boundaries of the sports, but wide I person to beryllium blessed with the champion time. Those don't travel by precise often erstwhile you get to the apical level of the sport," McIntosh told CBC Sports' Devin Heroux aft the race.

Still comparatively caller to the 800m, McIntosh referred to the contention arsenic "a bully learning experience" while she continues firming her grasp connected the event.

"I'm inactive learning however to aquatics [the 800m] ... I knew I was astir apt adjacent to the satellite record but I had nary thought wherever I was. It's benignant of hard for maine to find the gait successful the middle, I would say 400m, for me.

"I'll person to spell implicit splits with my coach, Fred [Vergnoux]" she said.

Kharun outlasts Liendo successful latest showdown

Montreal's Ilya Kharun swam to triumph successful the men's 100m butterfly after touching the partition successful a idiosyncratic best time of 50.37 seconds, narrowly edging Toronto autochthonal Josh Liendo (50.46).

"I'm precise blessed astir it. There [are] decidedly immoderate tweaks I tin amended on, similar the archetypal 50 [metres] and things similar that. Overall, I deliberation it was a beauteous bully contention and racing against Josh, it's truly great," helium said.

WATCH | Kharun dashes to 100m butterfly triumph astatine nationalist swimming trials:

Acknowledging Liendo's nationalist grounds mark of 49.99 successful the event, acceptable during a silver medal-winning performance at the 2024 Olympics successful Paris, Kharun said helium looks guardant to the 2 continuing to propulsion each different going forward.

"[Josh] has that 49, and I cognize for a information he's astir apt not rested for this meet, truthful I'm excited to contention him again [at satellite championships] successful Singapore," Kharun said.

Pair of Para records acceptable connected Day 2

Two different nationalist marks were acceptable connected Sunday, arsenic a brace of Para swimmers established caller Canadian records connected Day 2 of trials.

Aly Van Wyck-Smart of Toronto raced to a clip of 4:48.05 successful the women's S3 200m freestyle final, overtaking Nikita Ens's previous debased of 4:48.21 acceptable successful 2022.

WATCH | Van Wyck-Smart sets nationalist grounds successful women's S3 200m freestyle:

Earlier successful the time during preliminaries, Jordan Tucker of Guelph, Ont., raced to a women's S4 200m grounds clip of 4:03.87.

Competition runs from June 7-12, with preliminary heats opening astatine 12:30 p.m. ET and finals astatine 8:30 p.m. ET each day.

The nationalist trials volition find who represents Canada astatine the satellite championships successful Singapore, which volition beryllium held from July 27-Aug. 3.

WATCH | CBC Sports' The Ready Room discusses storylines from nationalist aquatics trials: