By Sophie Kaufman on SwimSwam
2025 World Championships
July 27 – August 3, 2025 (pool swimming) Singapore, Singapore World Aquatics Championships Arena LCM (50m) Meet Central How To Watch SwimSwam Preview Index Entry Book Live Results Live Recaps Prelims: Day 1 | Day 2 Finals: Day 1 | Day 2 Euro Recap, Day 1: Lukas Märtens Earns First World Title, Completes Epic Year In 400 FreeIt’s only been two days of competition at the 2025 World Aquatic Championships, but Roos Vanotterdijk is already flying high. Vanotterdijk entered seven events for the meet, making her the busiest swimmer in Singapore. But with only the women’s 100 butterfly completed, she’s broken the Belgian record three times and won a silver medal.
Vanotterdijk rode a wave of momentum into the 2025 World Championships. Coming into the championships she set her 100 butterfly national record at 57.05. This season, she’s also broken the Belgian record in the 100 freestyle (53.62), 50 backstroke (27.81), 100 backstroke (58.97), 50 butterfly (25.63), and 200 IM (2:09.73).
This is her first season training with high-profile coach Mark Faber, who took over as the head of the Flemish Swimming Federation last November. Faber, 51, left his role as the head of the High Performance Center in Amsterdam where he worked with breaststroke aces like Arno Kamminga, Tes Schouten, and Caspar Corbeau. In November 2023, allegations surfaced about Faber abusing his power, bullying and intimidating his swimmers. He was cleared of any wrongdoing five months later.
At Faber’s press conference as the head of the Flemish Swimming Federation he said “the intention is to make Belgian swimming sexy again…the positive thing is that there is a lot of potential and that there are many medals to be won in swimming, but there is a lot of work to be done and the competition is fierce. We need time to grow.”
Vanotterdijk has progressed quickly since the coaching change. “I’ve been able to put some really great training in,” she shared after her race. “We did a lot more competitions…I think that was the biggest thing that changed over this last year that’s really helped me.”
She held a 57.25 lifetime best in the 100 butterfly when Faber took over the program. She improved that to 57.05 in April but exploded in Singapore. She broke 57 seconds for the first time in prelims with a 56.66. That night, she tied world record holder Gretchen Walsh for the fastest time in semifinals with a 56.07.
That was already a drop of nearly a second, but Vanotterdijk was not done yet. She had her best swim in the final, winning silver in 55.84. The time marks a 1.21 second drop for the Belgian at the meet and makes her the ninth woman to crack the 56 second barrier.
“I knew some good things could happen [at this meet],” Vanotterdijk said in her post-race interview. “It already happened in the heats and the semifinals and I was really, really pleased with how that went…I just went into the final without any expectations, just trying to enjoy myself and just go in with full confidence and see what can happen. And something incredible happened.”
This is Vanotterdijk’s first medal on the senior global stage. It’s also Belgium’s first medal at the World Championships since 1998. “That’s seven years before I was born,” Vanotterdijk shared.
Like Faber in his first press conference, Vanotterdijk also wants to raise the profile of Belgian swimming. It’s not one of the most popular sports in the country, but “we’re trying to change that and I think this [medal] will certainly help this,” she said.
Quick Hits
All Euro Podium In Men’s 50 Fly Rewrites All-Time Performers List
50m Fly Medal Winners – Ponti, Grousset, Ceccon (credit: Nardia Mulkerrins)
Seven of the eight finalists in the men’s 50 butterfly were European, so it was not a shock to see the continent sweep the podium. Maxime Grousset and Noe Ponti separated themselves slightly from the rest of the pack and Grousset got his hands on the wall three-hundredths ahead of Ponti, the short-course world record holder.
This is Grousset’s second individual long-course world title; he previously won gold in the 100 butterfly at the 2023 World Championships. He stopped the clock in 22.48, improving on the 22.61 French record he swam in the semifinals. Ponti reset his national record with a 22.51, and Thomas Ceccon knocked a hundredth off his Italian record to snag bronze 20 minutes after his 100 backstroke semifinal.
All three of these men were already in the top ten all-time performers list, but this final caused some reshuffling. In his post-race interview, Ponti said he thought it was the fastest 50 butterfly final ever.
Updated All-Time Top Performer Rankings
Andrii Govorov, Ukraine – 22.27 (2018) Caeleb Dressel, USA – 22.35 (2019) Rafa Munoz, Spain – 22.43 (2009) Maxime Grousset, France — 22.48 (2025) *NEW* Noe Ponti, Switzerland — 22.51 (2025) *NEW* Nicholas Santos, Brazil – 22.60 (2023) Oleg Kostin, Russia – 22.62 (2023) Milorad Cavic, Serbia & Thomas Ceccon, Italy — 22.67 (2009)/(2025) *NEW* — Ilya Kharun, Canada — 22.68 (2025)Nicolo Martinenghi Battles To Silver In 100 Breaststroke
Nicolo Martinenghi (photo: Jack Spitser)
Nicolo Martinenghi, the Paris Olympic champion in the 100 breaststroke, did not have the easiest path through the rounds of the event in Singapore. He was originally disqualified after the semifinals, but was reinstated on appeal, putting him in lane five for tonight’s final.
“It was really strange, you know,” he said after the final. “I had two different feelings. One, really bad straight after the race. And then really good when they told me there was a mistake. The sport is like that, you have to be ready to restart everything from zero.”
But as Martinenghi shared, he was also restarting from zero in a different way. Several swimmers on Team USA have been dealing with “acute gastroenteritis” during the first days of the competition, and Martinenghi revealed he was experiencing similar symptoms. “I threw up the whole night so I’ve got nothing inside me right now,” he said.
Still, Martinenghi lit up the final. He was the first man to 50 meters and the only one to take the race out sub-27 seconds in the final. Qin Haiyang passed Martinenghi down the stretch, but the Olympic champion held on for silver in 58.58.
“I’m really proud of myself tonight. That silver was a goal for me, especially after yesterday,” he said. “I’ve got only my heart and my brain working right now, so I compete with that today. That’s why this silver medal feels like a gold for me.”
Olympic Medalists Miss Finals
Matthew Richards (photo: Jack Spitser)
Several notable European swimmers missed out on finals in their signature event. First, Ruta Meilutyte–along with Lilly King–missed the women’s 100 breaststroke final. Meilutyte swam 1:06.57 to finish 13th overall. Paris bronze medalist Mona McSharry is out of the final as well after clocking 1:06.33 for 11th. Estonia’s Eneli Jefimova was another surprising miss after she swam 1:05.81 at the AP Race International in May.
Then, Paris Olympic silver medalist Matt Richards was a surprising miss in the men’s 200 freestyle final. Richards was the 2023 world champion in this event as well but won’t contend for this year’s title after swimming 1:45.85 to finish 12th overall.
National Records
Women’s and Men’s 100 Backstroke
Hubert Kos sliced three-hundredths off his Hungarian record in the 100 backstroke to qualify first overall for tomorrow night’s final. He swam 52.21 in the semifinal, dropping from the 52.24 he swam at the Hungarian Championships in April. Miroslav Knedla lowered his Czech record as he tied for 12th in the men’s 100 backstroke semifinals. He swam 53.15, dropping .13 seconds from the 2023 World Junior Championships.Men’s 50 Butterfly
Just as there was in the semifinals, there was a flurry of national records in the final of the men’s 50 butterfly. We’ve already talked about the podiu, but the top four swimmers actually all swam national records. Diogo Matos Ribeiro, the Doha world champion, swam 22.77, dropping three-hundredths from his swim at the 2023 World Championships to improve the Portugese record. Sixth-place finisher Luca Armbruster lowered his German record from the semifinals. He swam 22.84, slicing .07 seconds from the 22.91 he put up in the semifinals as he tied with Nyls Korstanje in the final.Men’s 200 Freestyle
Kamil Sieradzki swam a huge Polish record to qualify for the men’s 200 freestyle final. He blazed to a 1:45.00, dropping 1.02 seconds from the previous record, which he set at the Polish Championships in April this year. Italy’s Carlos D’Ambrosio also swam a national record to make his way into the men’s 200 freestyle final tomorrow night. He qualified fifth in 1:45.23, breaking Filippo Megli‘s record of 1:45.67 from the 2019 World Championships. A day after leading off Norway’s record-setting men’s 4×100 freestyle relay with a 100 freestyle national record, Sander Sørensen took down the Nordic record in the 200 freestyle. He finished 9th in the 200 freestyle semifinals with a 1:45.78, breaking Robin Hanson‘s 1:45.91 record from the 2025 Swedish Championships. Ralph Daleiden also broke his 100 freestyle national record on Day 1 in Singapore while leading off the Luxembourg men’s 4×100 freestyle relay. Like Sørenson, he broke the 200 freestyle national record today. Daleiden took almost a second off the 1:48.67 record he swam in June with a 1:47.74 in the heats. In the heats, Dimitrios Markos swam 1:46.28, taking almost two-tenths off the Greek record he swam at the 2024 European Championships.Continental Medal Table Thru Day 2
Nation Gold Silver Bronze Total France 1 0 0 1 Germany 1 0 0 1 Italy 0 2 1 3 Belgium 0 1 0 1 Switzerland 0 1 0 1 Netherlands 0 0 1 1
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