Dylan Carter Rips 20.77 50 Free, Rewrites T&T National Record from 2012

Dylan Carter broke a 10-year-old Trinidad & Tobago national record with a 20.77 in the men’s 50-meter freestyle on Friday en route to his first World Cup win at the first stop of the series in Berlin.

🇹🇹 Dylan Carter prevails in front of Kyle Chalmers 🇦🇺 and Florent Manaudou 🇫🇷 in the Men's 50m Free by less than 0.30s #SWC2022 pic.twitter.com/ZgqCjOdB7l

— FINA (@fina1908) October 22, 2022

The 26-year-old USC graduate was .32 seconds faster than his previous best of 21.09 from the ISL playoffs last year, sneaking under the old national record of 20.82 by George Bovell in 2012. Bovell is a five-time Olympian and former world record holder who captured Trinidad & Tobago’s first Olympic swimming medal in 2004 with a bronze in the 200 IM. 

MEN’S 50 FREE – FINAL

• World Record: 20.16, Caeleb Dressel (USA) – 2020
• World Junior Record: 20.98, Kenzo Simons (NED) – 2019
• World Cup Record: 20.48, Vladimir Morozov (RUS) – 2018

1. Dylan Carter (TTO), 20.77
2. Kyle Chalmers (AUS), 21.04
3. Florent Manaudou (FRA), 21.05
4. Karol Ostrowski (POL), 21.17
5. Vladyslav Bukhov (UKR), 21.28
6. Maxime Grousset (FRA), 21.31
7. Thom de Boer (NED), 21.32
8. Kenzo Simons (NED), 21.47

Carter rose to the occasion against quick competition at Europa-Sportpark. Runner-up finisher Kyle Chalmers of Australia (21.04) had won this race in three out of the four World Cup stops last year. He was just a few hundredths of a second slower than his winning time from the opening Berlin stop in 2021 (21.01). Bronze medalist Florent Manaudou of France (21.05) is a former world record holder. 

Carter owns two major international medals from Short Course World Championships in 2018 (bronze) and 2021 (silver), both in the 50 butterfly. He didn’t swim any freestyle events at Short Course Worlds last year, scratching from the 100 free, but he may change his approach this year after his huge sub-21 time drop.