By Madeline Folsom on SwimSwam
2025 World Aquatics World Cup Series
October 10-25, 2025 Stops: Carmel, Indiana – Westmont, Illinois – Toronto, Canada SCM (25 Meters)The 2025 World Aquatics World Cup came to a conclusion in an absolutely electric session on Saturday night that saw five World Records. Over the course of the series, we saw 13 new World Records, eight of which were set over the three nights in Toronto.
There were also some strong swims that weren’t new World Records, but they marked significant drops, huge wins over massive swimmers, or other records broken.
We have compiled a list of our Top 10 Swims from the series, plus a few honorable mentions.
Honorable Mentions:
Regan Smith (100 Backstroke- Westmont): American Regan Smith won the 100 backstroke at the first two stops of the World Cup series. In Westmont, she won the event in World Record fashion, tying her own record from the 2024 SC World Championships at 54.02. She won the event by more than a second over Aussie rival Kaylee McKeown and picked up new World Cup and U.S. Open records in the process. Ilya Kharun (200 fly- Westmont): Canada’s Ilya Kharun finished 4th in the overall World Cup standings after he picked up two Triple Crowns in the 50 and 200 butterfly events. His 200 fly in Westmont was not quite a best time, coming in at 1:48.46 to just miss the 1:48.24 mark he set at SC worlds last year. It was a new World Cup and U.S. Open record, and he won the event by nearly a second. Gretchen Walsh (100 fly- Toronto): Gretchen Walsh earned a spot on the full top-10 list with her World Record 50 fly, but her 100 fly in Toronto deserved a mention as well. She came in at 53.10 to win the women’s event by more than two seconds and set the 3rd fastest time in history. She was about four tenths off her World Record time, but she was still almost a second faster than the next fastest performer in history.#10. Shaine Casas (USA), Men’s 200 IM (Carmel) — 1:49.43
At the first stop of the 2025 World Cup in Carmel, Shaine Casas won the men’s 200 IM by three tenths of a second, taking down the World Record holder in the event, Leon Marchand, with a bold race strategy.
Casas touched in 1:49.43 to break his own American Record of 1:49.51 from the SC World Championships. The biggest difference in his splits from the two swims came from his final 50 where he was more than half-a-second faster.
He also outsplit Marchand, who is the reigning the Olympic Champion in the 200 breast, on the breaststroke leg by four hundredths of a second.
This was the 2nd fastest swim in history, coming in only behind the World Record. It also broke Daiya Seto‘s 2019 U.S. Open record of 1:50.76 making Casas the fastest 200 IMer on American soil ever.
He was not able to match this time over the next two stops, but he went on to win the Triple Crown in the event and finish 2nd in the overall standings.
#9. Hubert Kos (HUN), Men’s 100 Backstroke (Toronto) — 48.16 — World Record
Hubert Kos broke two World Records at the final stop in Toronto, and the 100 backstroke was the 2nd of the two.
He picked up his final Triple Crown with his win in the men’s 100 back, touching in 48.16 to take down Coleman Stewart‘s 48.33 World Record from 2021 by nearly two tenths of a second.
He came in more than a second ahead of 2nd place, turning in 23.07 at the 50 mark, which would have been good enough for 5th overall in the individual 50 backstroke.
Kos dropped more than six tenths from his previous best of 48.78 from the prior weekend in Westmont, dropping the World Cup record and the Hungarian records in the process.
This swim secured his place at the top of the overall standings, earning him $100,000 for the win, the $10,000 Triple Crown bonus, and an additional $10,000 World Record bonus.
#8. Hubert Kos (HUN), Men’s 200 Backstroke (Toronto) — 1:45.12 — World Record
Hubert Kos shattered Mitch Larkin’s 10-year-old World Record in the men’s 200 backstroke on night one of the World Cup in Toronto. He touched in 1:45.12, taking more than half-a-second off the 1:45.63 record from 2015.
Kos already held the 2nd fastest performance in history, with his time at the 2024 SC World Championships coming in just two-hundredths over the World Record time. Besides Kos himself, only one swimmer had been within a second of Larkin’s time in the last decade.
This swim marked Kos’s first World Record and was a half-second faster than his previous best time of 1:45.65. He was much faster than his previous best through the first three 50 splits, turning nearly a second-and-a-half faster than his best time splits at the 150 mark. He dropped off that blistering pace slightly on his final 50, splitting 26.97, but he still came in far under his previous best and the former World Record.
Kos now sits more than a second ahead the next fastest performer of the last decade, Evgeny Rylov‘s 1:46.37 from 2020.
#7. Kaylee McKeown (AUS), Women’s 200 Backstroke (Toronto) — 1:57.33 — World Record
Kaylee McKeown broke the 200 backstroke World Record twice over the course of the series, taking about half-a-second off the record the second time. Her swim in Toronto of 1:57.33 was nearly seven tenths faster than Regan Smith‘s former World Record of 1:58.04.
She first broke the record in Westmont, swimming 1:57.87. In Toronto she knocked another half-a-second off the record to swim 1:57.33, winning the event by half-a-second over Smith, who also came in under World Record time.
The biggest difference in her splits came in the final 50 where she swam a blistering 29.77 after turning just off record pace at the 150 mark.
The next fastest performer not named Smith or McKeown is Katinka Hosszu who sits back at 1:59.23 from 2014.
McKeown won the Triple Crown, and $10,000 with her swim in Toronto. She ultimately finished 2nd in the Toronto rankings, after busting Regan Smith‘s Crown in the 100 back, and 3rd in the overall standings.
#6. Gretchen Walsh (USA), Women’s 50 Butterfly (Carmel) — 23.72 — World Record
Gretchen Walsh only broke one World Record over the course of the 2025 World Cup series, and it came in the first stop of the meet.
In Carmel, she swam 23.72 in the 50 butterfly to break her own World Record time of 23.94 by two tenths of a second.
She came in nearly a second ahead of the next fastest swimmer, which is a huge margin in a 50. She also widened the gap between herself and the next fastest performer in history again, with former World Record holder Therese Alshammar of Sweden sitting 2nd at 24.38.
Counting all three meets, Walsh now holds the top 11 performances in history in the event, with her top three swims coming from the World Cup series.
#5. Josh Liendo (CAN), Men’s 100 Butterfly (Toronto) — 47.68 — World Record
Josh Liendo‘s 100 fly World Record is different than many of the records on this list because he did not demolish it. He came in at 47.68, knocking three hundredths off Noe Ponti’s 47.71 record from the 2024 World Championships.
While not the most dominant record, it was one of the most surprising. Liendo has been knocking on the door of World and NCAA records for years now as one of the best swimmers in the world, but he was not at his peak during the first two stops.
In Carmel, he finished 4th in the event, touching in 50.20, slower than the 50.09 he swam at the LC World Championships in Singapore over the summer. He was faster in Westmont, swimming 49.65 to finish 3rd, but this swim was still off his lifetime best of 49.37 from last fall.
The home soil in Toronto was kind to Liendo, however, and he had arguably the best swim of his career in the 100 fly final on night one, dropping nearly two seconds to pick up his first individual Word Record.
#4. Mollie O’Callaghan (AUS), Women’s 200 Freestyle (Westmont) — 1:49.77 — World Record
The women’s 200 free World Record fell twice to Aussie Mollie O’Callaghan during the series. Once in Westmont and again in Toronto. The Westmont swim is the one that makes this list, despite her Toronto time being faster, because it marked her first individual World Record, and the first time any woman had ever been under 1:50 in the event.
Going into the Westmont meet, O’Callaghan’s best time in the event was the 1:50.77 she swam in Carmel. With that time, she won the event by a second-and-a-half, but it was just the beginning for her.
The next week in Westmont, O’Callaghan swam 1:49.77 to knock more than half-a-second off Siobhan Haughey‘s World Record time of 1:50.31 from 2021 and win the event by more than two seconds.
She came home in a massive 27.88 split, which was the biggest difference maker in her World Record time from Haughey’s 28.28.
In Toronto, she would take another four tenths off her World Record to swim 1:49.36, putting herself nearly a second ahead of Siobhan Haughey‘s 1:50.31 as the 2nd fastest performer in history.
#3. Caspar Corbeau (NED), Men’s 200 Breaststroke (Toronto) — 1:59.52 — World Record
Caspar Corbeau won the men’s 200 breaststroke in Toronto, touching in 1:59.52, becoming the first person to break 2:00 in the event, crushing the former World Record time of 2:00.16 set in 2018 by Russia’s Kirill Prigoda.
Before this swim, Corbeau was the 11th fastest performer in history in the event, sitting at 2:01.63 from his Carmel event win. This time was not even the Dutch record in the event, sitting two tenths over the 2:01.43 mark set by Arno Kamminga in 2020.
In Toronto, Corbeau was shot out of a cannon in the event, getting out four tenths under World Record pace at the 50 and nearly a second under the record at the 150 mark, turning in 1:27.84 to Prigoda’s 1:28.75.
Corbeau won the Triple Crown and the $10,000 bonus in the event, also picking up the $10,000 World Record bonus. He also finished 3rd in the overall standings, coming in just 0.2 points behind Shaine Casas.
#2. Lani Pallister (AUS), Women’s 800 Freestyle (Toronto) — 7:54.00 — World Record
Lani Pallister had an excellent World Cup Series, winning the 400 freestyle and the women’s distance event (alternated between the 800 and 1500) at all three stops.
Her 800 freestyle in Toronto was one of the best swims of the series, and, just like many of the other records on this list, it marked her first individual World Record swim.
She touched in 7:54.00 to demolish Katie Ledecky‘s 2022 World Record time of 7:57.42. She also dropped nearly eight seconds from her previous best time of 8:01.95 from the 2024 SC World Championships.
Pallister was out in 3:54.16 at the 400 meter mark, more than two seconds faster than Ledecky’s World Record swim. That time would have finished 2nd in the individual 400 freestyle at the meet, only behind Pallister herself.
Any time a Ledecky World Record is broken, it is a big deal, but it’s especially significant when it’s broken by this wide of a margin even if Ledecky hasn’t swum a ton of short course meters over her career.
#1. Kate Douglass (USA), Women’s 100 Freestyle (Toronto) — 49.93 — World Record
There were a lot of excellent swims and fast World Records set over the three meet series, but Kate Douglass’s 49.93 in the women’s 100 freestyle was in a league of its own.
With this swim, she became the first woman in history under 50 seconds in the event, taking three tenths off her own World Record time of 50.19 from the Westmont stop of the Cup just a week prior.
Coming into the series, the record belonged to Cate Campbell at 50.25 from 2017 with Gretchen Walsh sitting 2nd at 50.31 from the 2024 SC Worlds in December.
In Toronto Douglass was out just off record pace at 23.93, but she came back in 26.00, faster than the blistering 26.04 Campbell swam to come home in 2017, and faster than the 26.31 she swam to close her record from Westmont.
Through the series, Douglass and Walsh were locked in a tight battle for the top of the podium, but with this time, Douglass secured her spot at the top of the overall leaderboard, winning $100,000 for the win plus the $10,000 Triple Crown bonus and the $10,000 World Record bonus.
She now holds the World Records in the 100 free, 200 breaststroke and the 200 IM, making her one of the most versatile athletes in history.
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