Update: Erika Fairweather on Thursday morning took silver in the 200m freestyle, making her NZ’s most successful world championships swimmer. She still has the 800m event to swim.
Otago middle distance swimmer Erika Fairweather can now call herself a world champion, after winning the 400m freestyle title at the World Aquatics championships in Doha this morning – also qualifying for the Paris Olympics in a New Zealand record time.
Until today, nobody from New Zealand had ever won gold at a long-course world championship. Fairweather was also the most recent New Zealander to win a World Junior title, back in 2015.
Fairweather went out quickly, splitting 1:58.41, the only swimmer to split under two minutes. She increasingly extended her lead over second placed China’s Li Bingjie, who is the short course (25m pool) world record holder in the event.
Fairweather’ final time was 3:59.44, more than two seconds ahead of Bingjie.
“How crazy is that? I’m so happy with that, and am really excited with what’s to come,” Fairweather said in her post-swim interview. “I just wanted to get to that wall first, and we just went with that.
“World Champs is all about how you show up, and I’m really proud of how I showed up tonight,” Fairweather said of the absence of her key rivals.
“Did you hear the New Zealand national anthem? That was pretty epic! It was great to experience the New Zealand national anthem for once.”
Fellow Kiwi Olympian Eve Thomas was also swimming the final. It’s rare for two Aquablacks to qualify for a world championship in the same event, let alone also do so in the final. Thomas also clocked a personal best, 4:05.87 for seventh, just 0.14 seconds behind sixth.
In the heats on Sunday evening (NZ time) Fairweather led up to the 350m mark when she was headed off by 0.05 seconds by China’s Li Bingjie, in the adjacent lane.
In the other lane next to Fairweather was Thomas, who considers the two longer freestyle events her key Doha events but has made significant gains in the 400m freestyle recently and was only 0.02 off her personal best to get fifth into her first 400m freestyle final at a pinnacle competition, also qualifying her for Paris.
The previous best at a long course (50m pool) world championship during the past decade was Lauren Boyle’s silver at the 2015 championships in Kazan, although three years prior she won gold at a short course (25m pool) world championship.
The only male Aquablack who has graced a podium at a world championship since 1994 is Lewis Clareburt, who won a bronze medal in the 400m individual medley in 2019. Like Fairweather this week, he did so soon after turning 20.
Gold medallists take home US$20,000 (NZD $32,400) per race, but just three female gold medallists from last year’s world championship at Fukuoka are in Doha, as the Paris Olympic Games are just five months away. Consequently, Fairweather, the sole 400m freestyle medallist at Fukuoka competing this week, headed the 400m freestyle, seeded three seconds clear of the field and therefore expected to win. She must be at Doha to assist in attempting to qualify the women’s 4x200m relay team for Paris later this week.
At Fukuoka, Fairweather became the fifth woman to ever swim under four minutes in the 400m freestyle, winning bronze and US$10,000. but this year was seeded more than three seconds ahead of the field.
The World Aquatics championships debuted in 1973, but this is the first time it has been held in an Olympic year. Originally slated for November 2023, it had to be scheduled in an Olympic year as Covid forced last year’s Fukuoka championships to be modified twice, initially due to the rescheduled Tokyo Olympics. World Aquatics needed to honour a contract with Doha, and this month was the only time it could do so.
Fairweather also won two silver medals in December at her first world short course championships in Melbourne, meaning she now has a world championship medal of every colour. She is also competing in the 800m freestyle with Thomas on Friday, where she has high hopes of another medal.
Fairweather is also third seed in the 800m and 200m freestyle events later this week, with Thomas also having a big met; she is seeded top 10 in three events with the 1500m and 800m freestyles to come. Both are also in the women’s 4x200m freestyle relay team.
On Friday American Katie Ledecky swam a time of 4:02.39 in the 400m freestyle during the weekend in the US, and in the weekend Canada’s Summer McIntosh clocked 8:11.39 in the 800m freestyle to be the second fastest performer of all time.
