Never count out Kyle Chalmers.
The 24-year-old Aussie sprint ace erased a 1.3-second deficit on the final leg of the men’s 4×100 medley relay on Sunday at the 2022 Short Course World Championships, helping his Australian squad tie the United States for gold and set a new world record (3:18.98) along the way.
Chalmers’ 44.63 split on the freestyle anchor is the fastest in history, giving Australia its national-record 13th gold medal in the last race of the meet. His performance wasn’t the only comeback of the race as 22-year-old American Kieran Smith out-split Italy’s Alessandro Miressi by three-tenths over the final 25 meters to get his hand on the wall with Chalmers. For a detailed breakdown of this back-and-forth relay, click here.
A new shared WOOOOORLD RECORD 🚨
USA 🇺🇸 & Australia 🇦🇺 share gold in the Men's 4×100 Medley Relay ⏱️3:18.98 #FINAMelbourne22 pic.twitter.com/eVanHmaZCX— World Aquatics (@WorldAquatics) December 18, 2022
This is your LIVEBARN Race of the Week because of the multiple comebacks that took place during the last length of the pool alone. Chalmers went from about half a body length behind at the final turn to ahead of the pack in the blink of an eye, but Smith’s surge at the end was almost as impressive. No one likes sharing, but in this case we’ll make an exception: Both the U.S. and Aussie quartets certainly deserved this crown.
Australia (3:18.98), U.S. (3:18.98), and Italy (3:19.06) were all under the Russian Federation’s previous world record of 3:19.16 that had stood untouched since 2009.
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Has this ever happened before in swimming at any WC or Olympic meet? I wonder what the odds are of it happening again?
How do the WR splits get used for future relays? Do they go alphabetically?
I vote for two simultaneous lines
I suspect there will never be a more dramatic end to a swim meet in world history!