2022 FINA WORLD CUP CIRCUIT
- October 21 – November 5, 2022
- Leg 1: Oct. 21-23 – Berlin, Germany
- Leg 2: Oct. 28-30 – Toronto, Canada
- Leg 3: Nov. 3-5 – Indianapolis, Indiana
- SCM (25 meters)
- World Cup Central
The three-leg 2022 FINA World Cup Series kicks off on Friday, October 21 in Berlin, Germany. In anticipation of that launch, we took the opportunity to review the all-time winningest World Cup swimmers in the history of the series, which launched in 1988.
Only two new swimmers entered the men’s top 50 last year. Tom Shields, with 10 wins, moved up into 35th place all-time with 26 total wins. While the USA historically dominates medals tables for most international competitions, a long-running refusal to take these Short Course World Cup meets seriously means that the Americans are generally far down the rankings lists here. Shields ranks 4th among Americans.
He is scheduled to swim all three World Cup Series stops this season.
Arno Kamminga, who won 8 events, moved up into 40th place all-time with 22 career wins. That is more than any other Dutch man has won in the series’ history.
Japan’s Daiya Seto won 8 races, which moved him into solo control of 8th place on the all-time rankings. He is not entered in this year’s World Cup Series.
On the women’s side, while many of the highly-ranked all-time event winners are still active (Katinka Hosszu, Sarah Sjostrom, Cate Campbell), very few of them raced in last year’s series – and none are expected this year either.
Russian swimmer Yulia Efimova climbed the all-time rankings with 4 wins, though she is ineligible to compete this year because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine earlier this year.
The biggest move up the rankings was Dutch swimmer Kira Toussaint, who won a whopping 11 races last season. She entered the season ranked tied for 42nd all-time, but has moved into the top 20. A broken finger is keeping her out of at least the first stop of the series at the Berlin World Cup.
Emma McKeon, the high scorer for women in last year’s series, won 10 races. She has been competing in World Cup meets for over a decade, though never at a really deep level like she did in 2021. Those 10 wins bring her up to 18 career wins, including several relay victories.
Men’s Top 50 (+1 for ties)
| Rank | Gold medals | MEN | Country |
| 1 | 146 | LE CLOS Chad | RSA |
| 2 | 123 | MOROZOV Vladimir | RUS |
| 3 | 65 | SCHOEMAN Roland | RSA |
| 4 | 59 | VAN DER BURGH Cameron | RSA |
| 5 | 54 | BAL Randall | USA |
| 6 | 53 | FOSTER Mark | GBR |
| 6 | 53 | KELLER Christian | GER |
| 8 | 51 | SETO Daiya | JPN |
| 9 | 43 | NEETHLING Ryk | RSA |
| 10 | 42 | POPOV Alexander | URS/RUS |
| 11 | 41 | LARKIN Mitchell | AUS |
| 11 | 41 | HOFFMANN Jörg | GER |
| 13 | 40 | HICKMAN James | GBR |
| 14 | 38 | PEREIRA Thiago | BRA |
| 14 | 38 | MOSES Ed | USA |
| 16 | 37 | LISOGOR Oleg | UKR |
| 17 | 35 | HURLEY Bobby | AUS |
| 17 | 35 | RUPPRATH Thomas | GER |
| 19 | 34 | HOLMERTZ Anders | SWE |
| 20 | 33 | KLIM Michael | AUS |
| 20 | 33 | LEZAK Jason | USA |
| 20 | 33 | TEWKSBURY Mark | CAN |
| 23 | 32 | SELKOV Vladimir | RUS |
| 24 | 31 | DONETC Stanislav | RUS |
| 25 | 30 | LOADER Danyon | NZL |
| 25 | 30 | MELLOULI Oussama | TUN |
| 27 | 29 | SILANTIEV Denis | UKR |
| 27 | 29 | TOWNSEND Darian | RSA |
| 27 | 29 | WARNECKE Mark | GER |
| 30 | 28 | HUEGILL Geoff | AUS |
| 30 | 28 | SIEVINEN Jani | FIN |
| 32 | 27 | SPRENGER Christian | AUS |
| 32 | 27 | WOUDA Marcel | NED |
| 32 | 27 | THORPE Ian | AUS |
| 35 | 26 | SHIELDS Tom | USA |
| 36 | 25 | SKVORTSOV Nikolay | RUS |
| 36 | 25 | FRASER-HOLMES Thomas | AUS |
| 36 | 25 | PRILUKOV Yury | RUS |
| 39 | 24 | LETZIN Jirka | GER |
| 40 | 22 | THELOKE Stev | GER |
| 40 | 22 | GYURTA Daniel | HUN |
| 40 | 22 | Arno Kamminga | NED |
| 43 | 21 | KOCH Marco | GER |
| 43 | 21 | MARSHALL Peter | USA |
| 45 | 20 | SACCHI Luca | ITA |
| 45 | 20 | XU JiZayu | CHN |
| 47 | 19 | PRIGODA Kirill | RUS |
| 47 | 19 | TO Kenneth | HKG |
| 47 | 19 | PANKRATOV Denis | RUS |
| 47 | 19 | PHELPS Michael | USA |
| 47 | 19 | VOLKOV Dimitri | URS |
Women’s Top 50 (+4 for Ties)
| Ranks | Wins | Swimmer | Country |
| 1 | 309 | Katinka Hosszu | HUN |
| 2 | 105 | MORAVCOVA Martina | SVK |
| 3 | 93 | ALSHAMMAR Therese | SWE |
| 4 | 74 | ATKINSON Alia | JAM |
| 5 | 63 | SJOSTROM Sarah | SWE |
| 6 | 58 | KLOCHKOVA Yana | UKR |
| 7 | 55 | SEEBOHM Emily | AUS |
| 8 | 52 | BUSCHSCHULTE Antje | GER |
| 8 | 52 | JACOBSEN Mette | DEN |
| 8 | 52 | OTTESEN GRAY Jeanette | DEN |
| 11 | 48 | EFIMOVA Yuliya | RUS |
| 12 | 45 | VOELKER Sandra | GER |
| 13 | 42 | VAN ALMSICK Franziska | GER |
| 14 | 41 | CAMPBELL Cate | AUS |
| 14 | 41 | Ranomi KROMOWIDJOJO | NED |
| 16 | 37 | THOMPSON Jenny | USA |
| 17 | 34 | SJOEBERG Johanna | SWE |
| 18 | 31 | POLL Claudia | CRC |
| 18 | 31 | ROLPH Sue | GBR |
| 20 | 29 | BELMONTE Mireia | ESP |
| 20 | 29 | DEKKER Inge | NED |
| 20 | 29 | TOUSSAINT Kira | NED |
| 23 | 27 | ZEVINA Daryna | UKR |
| 23 | 27 | LILLHAGE Josefin | SWE |
| 25 | 26 | COUGHLIN Natalie | USA |
| 26 | 25 | BECUE Brigitte | BEL |
| 27 | 24 | MEISSNER Katrin | GDR |
| 28 | 23 | MEAKLIM Katheryn | RSA |
| 28 | 23 | O’NEILL Susan | AUS |
| 30 | 22 | HUNGER Daniela | GER |
| 30 | 22 | HASE Dagmar | GER |
| 32 | 21 | HEEMSKERK Femke | NED |
| 32 | 21 | YANG Yu | CHN |
| 32 | 21 | HARDY Jessica | USA |
| 32 | 21 | HAN Xue | CHN |
| 32 | 21 | OSYGUS Simone | GER |
| 32 | 21 | KANETO Rie | JPN |
| 32 | 21 | CHEN Hua | CHN |
| 32 | 21 | JAKABOS Zsuzsanna | HUN |
| 40 | 20 | QI Hui | CHN |
| 41 | 19 | INGRAM Melissa | NZL |
| 41 | 19 | GOH Rachel | AUS |
| 41 | 19 | LI Lin | CHN |
| 44 | 18 | GUEHRER Marieke | AUS |
| 44 | 18 | ZHIVANEVSKAYA Nina | CIS/RUS/ESP |
| 44 | 18 | POTEC Camelia | ROM |
| 44 | 18 | KENNEDY Angela | AUS |
| 44 | 18 | KIRK Tara | USA |
| 44 | 18 | MCKEON Emma | AUS |
| 50 | 17 | COADA-CASLARU Beatrice | ROM |
| 50 | 17 | BENKO Lindsay | USA |
| 50 | 17 | PECZAK Alicja | POL |
| 50 | 17 | RILEY Samantha | AUS |
| 50 | 17 | SWEETNAM Nancy | CAN |
Major respect to Shields! He has been disrespected in the swim community as many forget the longevity of his career as well as the success he has had. Is he a Phelps or a Ledecky in the sport? No. But he is consistent, strong, and a real powerhouse in the history of American butterfly and swimming as a whole.
I think it would be very interesting for you to post money earned by swimmers on this circuit.
Total respect for Tom Shields. If I recall correctly, some seasons he made around $200K swimming World Cup races. Very smart on his part to show up, race some of the worlds best, get publicity for his sponsors, and make some very decent income in the process. Hard for me to understand why other USA swimmers don’t see this opportunity and take it.
We’ve done so most years. Here’s 2021: https://swimswam.com/mckeon-sates-toussaint-shields-earn-over-100k-from-fina-2021-world-cup/
Thank you! $103K not bad for swimming a few meets and doing some quality racing.
F me… nobody’s ever going to catch Katinka. That’s insane!
But, what the ranking shows is that there was a time where the World Cup series was awesome. I remember when I went to my first one in Berlin, sometime around 2000, I thought it was just such a fun meet. Also, one of the few meets to earn some money back then.