THE TRAINING I’VE DONE IS BEHIND ME, THIS IS THE FUN PART.

“I think it was incredible last summer to be part of that Canadian team,” she said. “It really gave us confidence and momentum to show we belong on the international stage. I think we were trying to continue that momentum and continue that success into these championships.”

While Masse says a growing sense of confidence has made the biggest difference for her over the last year, she’s put in a lot of work with University of Toronto swimming coaches Byron MacDonald and Linda Kiefer. They’ve analyzed her stroke during practices, worked on her with video analysis.

“The smaller details would be things like my start and transition, from the underwater into the swimming, and the turn especially,” she said.

Most important to her this week were their final words of advice.

“They just said have fun,” she said. “All the training that I’ve done is behind me, this is the fun part and this is the best part, just racing. Having fun, I think that’s the most important, as well.”

Masse’s parents, Cindy and Louie, travelled to Budapest to watch her compete. She said having them there made the win even sweeter.

“My parents, I’m super grateful that they’re able to travel here and come and watch me,” she said. “They really just leave it up to me. They know swimming’s my thing. They kind of just cheer me on. They’re the best.”

Masse returns to the pool Wednesday for the 50-metre backstroke. In other events Tuesday: American Katie Ledecky breezed to her third and fourth gold medals of the world championships, capturing the 1,500-metre freestyle by more than half the length of the pool and the 200-metre freestyle by .39 seconds. Having already won the 400 free and 4x100 free relay on the opening day of swimming, Ledecky stayed on course for a record-tying six golds by a female swimmer. Her third medal made her the first woman to win 12 gold medals at the world championships.

Kierra Smith of Kelowna, B.C. finished sixth in the 100-metre breaststroke final with a time of 1:06.90. It was her first international final in the distance. American Lilly King won gold. Smith will compete Thursday in the 200-metre breaststroke, in which she finished seventh at the Rio Olympics. Canadians MarySophie Harvey of Trois-Rivières, Que., (1:58.15) and Katerine Savard of Pont-Rouge, Que., (1:58.46) finished 14th and 15th in the women’s 200-metre freestyle.