Disclaimer: Swim of the Week is not meant to be a conclusive selection of the best overall swim of the week, but rather one Featured Swim to be explored in deeper detail. The Swim of the Week is an opportunity to take a closer look at the context of one of the many fast swims this week, perhaps a swim that slipped through the cracks as others grabbed the headlines, or a race we didn’t get to examine as closely in the flood of weekly meets.
After a busy month that included the ISL Final, Minnesota Invite, Winter Juniors and Short Course World Championships, the last week was a relatively light one amidst the holidays.
That made this week’s selection for Swim of the Week a pretty clear-cut one: Emre Sakci‘s world record in the men’s 50 breaststroke (SCM).
Sakci not only lowered the world record, but absolutely demolished it, clocking a time of 24.95 to knock three-tenths off the existing mark of 25.25 and become the first swimmer sub-25 in history.
Sakci did so while competing at the Turkish SC Championships (Dec. 24-28), also lowering national records in the 50 free (21.10) and 100 free (46.63).
That record had stood for more than 12 years, with Cameron van der Burgh setting the record during the super-suit era in 2009. Belarusian Ilya Shymanovich tied that record at the 2021 European SC Championships in November, a race in which Sakci was the runner-up in 25.39.
Prior to that swim from Shymanovich, Sakci held the European Record at 25.29, a time he did during the 2020 ISL season.
In breaking a 50-meter world record by three-tenths of a second, Sakci joined some rarefied air, with only Maggie MacNeil (women’s SCM 50 back, 0.33), Sarah Sjostrom (women’s LCM 50 fly, 0.53) and Florent Manaudou (men’s SCM 50 back, .39) having set a current world record by a greater margin in a 50m event.
You can watch Sakci’s world record swim below:
That’s a heck of a fast stroke turnover rate for a guy listed as 6’8″. Wow!