Breaststroke king Qin scoops top award after stellar year

BUDAPEST — China's Qin Haiyang and Australia's Kaylee McKeown were honored as the best male and best female swimmers of the year in a gala ceremony staged at the future headquarters of World Aquatics in Budapest, Hungary, on Monday.

Both athletes achieved remarkable success this season, winning all three events (50, 100, and 200 meters) at all three World Cup legs, held recently in Berlin, Athens, and Budapest.

At the 2023 World Aquatic Championships in Fukuoka, Japan, the 24-year-old Qin became the first swimmer in history to win all three breaststroke titles at a single edition of the event.

In addition, he claimed the 200m gold in a world-record time of 2:05.48, shaving 0.47 seconds off the previous mark set by Australia's Zac Stubblety-Cook.

Qin was named the Most Valuable Player in the men's division at the 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou. He also won five gold medals at the Chengdu World University Games.

"The proudest thing for me this year is breaking the record. It was a surprise. More importantly, I've had more improvements than last year, and that's really made me happy," said Qin, who won the award ahead of France's Leon Marchand and Tunisia's Ahmed Hafnaoui.

Marchand won 200m butterfly and 200m individual medley golds in Fukuoka, surpassing Michael Phelps' 200 IM world record in the process. Hafnaoui won the 800m and 1,500m freestyle races at the Fukuoka worlds, in addition to silver in the 400m freestyle.

Female award winner McKeown made history at the Fukuoka worlds by winning three distances in the same swimming event, topping the podium in the 50, 100, and 200m backstroke.

The 22-year-old also set world records in the 50m and 100m at the World Cup in Budapest, which saw her become the first swimmer in history to simultaneously hold the world record in all of the backstroke distances.

The event also featured the unveiling of the emblem for the upcoming World Short Course Swimming Championships in Budapest next year. The emblem features a silhouette of the Hungarian capital's iconic Chain Bridge.

Before the awards ceremony, the plans for the future headquarters of World Aquatics were unveiled. The center is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2026, but the global governing body plans to partially move to the Hungarian capital in the second half of next year.

Xinhua