Island swimmer Bennett sets world record at Olympic, Paralympic trials

From Parksville to Paris, Nicholas Bennett is looking to make the 2024 Paralympics pool his own this summer. The Islander set a world record Friday night at the Canadian Olympic and Paralympic swim trials in Toronto by winning the men’s SM-14 200-metre individual medley in 2:05.97.

That slashed more than a second off the previous world record of 2:07.50 set by Gabriel Bandeira of Brazil at the 2022 world championships in Madeira, Portugal. Bennett was the world silver medallist that year behind Bandeira before becoming world champion in the event in 2023 in Manchester, England.

“Last year in Manchester, I was about four tenths off it [world record]. The first 50 [Friday] felt amazing. Backstroke, we’ve been working on that, but it’s still a little bit of our weakest point. Then everything was just go, go, go for the last 100,” Bennett said in a statement.

Bennett began swimming with the Ravensong Aquatic Club in Qualicum Beach under coach Mike Thompson but is now coached by his sister Haley Bennett-Osborne, a former swimmer.

“With the help of my sister in the past year, we’ve been working on just refining everything,” added Bennett.

“I was expecting to take only a couple tenths off it [world record], not a whole second and a half. We’re well ahead of schedule.”

Bennett also qualified for the 2024 Paris Paralympics earlier in the trials in the men’s SB14 100-metre breaststroke. This will be his second Paralympics after competing in the delayed 2020 Tokyo Paralympic Games: “This is my first actual Paralympic trials. The last cycle, we didn’t have one [due to the pandemic]. So it’s like a completely new experience that I don’t really have words for yet. At some point it’ll sink in and I’ll have one or two words to actually encapsulate how overwhelmingly positive this feels for me.”

The 20-year-old Island standout, who will compete in the 2024 Paralympics in the autistic category, also has previous multisport Games experience with a gold medal in the 2022 Birmingham Commonwealth Games and three gold medals and a silver in the 2019 Lima Para Pan Am Games in Peru.

• Penny Oleksiak didn’t get what she set out for, but felt a sense of relief. Oleksiak won the women’s 100-metre freestyle Friday night.

The Toronto native’s time of 53.66 seconds was over the Olympic qualifying time of 53.61, but under the Olympic consideration time of 53.88.

So while Oleksiak can compete in the women’s 4x100-metre freestyle relay in Paris, there’s no guarantee she’ll race individual 100 free there. Athletes with the Olympic consideration times will be invited to compete only if the overall quota of 852 athletes hasn’t been reached after accounting for athletes qualified by way of the Olympic qualifying time, relays, and universality.