Daiya Seto Primed To Become Japan’s First-Ever Double IM Worlds Gold Medalist

2019 FINA WORLD AQUATICS CHAMPIONSHIPS

• All sports: Friday, July 12 – Sunday, July 28, 2019
• Pool swimming: Sunday, July 21 – Sunday, July 28, 2019
• The Nambu University Municipal Aquatics Center, Gwangju, Korea
• Meet site
• Competition Schedule
• FinaTV Live Stream
• Entry Lists
• Results

Japan’s Daiya Seto has claimed the nation’s sole individual gold medal here at the 2019 FINA World Aquatics Championships, having taken the men’s 200m IM in a lifetime best of 1:56.14 on Thursday.

The 25-year-old is primed to make it a double, entering the men’s 400m IM prelims tomorrow with the fastest time in the world this season of 4:07.95, holding a 3 second advantage over the rest of the globe.

But American Chase Kalisz, British record holder Max Litchfield and Hungary’s David Verraszto will be among those in hot pursuit, although Seto does have one extra incentive in his pocket. Any Japanese swimmer who wins gold here in Gwangju earns an automatic bid to race the same event at the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.

That seemed to light a fire for Seto in the 200m IM and may give him the edge in the longer race tomorrow. If he were to pull off the IM double, he would join the men before him who have accomplished the feat at a World Championships, which includes American Michael Phelps winning both IMs in 2003 and 2007, American Ryan Lochte doing the same back-to-back in 2009 and 2011, as well as American Chase Kalisz getting it done in 2017.

Japan finished 14th in the overall swimming medal table back in 2017 and has already made strides this time around positioned as 9th with one day to go. Adding another gold would help ease the sting of the nation missing 2 of its most dominant swimmers in the past years in Rikako Ikee and Kosuke Hagino. Ikee is battling leukemia, while Hagino is just getting back in the water after tending to his mental and physical health.

Asian Medals Through Day 7:

4	China	3	1	2	6

9	Japan	1	2	1	4