US Olympic champion Gretchen Walsh broke a 15-year-old world record in the 50m butterfly on Tuesday, December 10.
As per The Guardian, the player achieved a time of 24.02 in the 50m butterfly heats on the first morning of the Short Course World Championships in Budapest.
The previous record of 24.38 was set by Sweden’s Therese Alshammar in 2009, during the “shiny suit” era, a time when records were regularly broken.
Shortly after the race, the 21-year-old expressed, “Definitely an awesome way to start the meet, the best way I could have. I think I have a lot more to come in that race – just some details I could tune up and execute it a bit better.”
Walsh further expressed, “So I’m looking forward to semis and finals hopefully, just getting better and better so definitely excited for tonight.”
Walsh has now set two individual world records this year. One was in the 50m butterfly and the other was in the 100m butterfly at the US Olympic trials in June.
In addition to this, she won two gold medals in the 4x100m mixed medley and 4x100m medley relays at the summer Olympics.
The player also earned a silver medal in the 100m butterfly at the Paris Games.
