Race Footage: Chad le Clos Breaks Championship Record To Win 50 Butterfly

Race Video is courtesy of Universal Sports Network, a SwimSwam partner.

As reported by SwimSwam’s Jared Anderson:

MEN’S 50 BUTTERFLY – FINALS

• 2012 World Champ: 22.22 – Nicholas Santos – Brazil
• 2010 World Champ: 22.40 – Albert Subirats – Venezuela  
• Meet Record: 22.22 – Nicholas Santos – Brazil – 2012
• World Record: 21.80 – Steffen Deibler – Germany – 2009

Chad le Clos is well on his way to a butterfly sweep of these Short Course World Championships. The South African won the 50 fly crown after taking gold and setting a new world record in the 100 earlier on. His time of 21.95 just missed the world record by about a tenth here, but was still enough to beat Brazil’s tough sprinter Nicholas Santos and also took down the meet record. Le Clos will swim the 200 fly tomorrow in search of the sweep and his 4th individual gold of these championships.

Santos took silver in 22.08 as those top two separated themselves from the rest of the crew. In a tight battle for bronze, Andrii Govorov of the Ukraine topped Russia’s Aleksandr Popov 22.49 to 22.53, and American Tom Shields was just outside in 22.57.