Individual record first for Sth African swimmer

South Africa’s Tatjana Schoenmaker set the first individual swimming world record at the Tokyo Olympics yesterday.

On another busy day at the pool, Evgeny Rylov completed a backstroke double and Emma McKeon gave the mighty Aussie women another gold.

Schoenmaker, a 24-year-old South African, won the women’s 200m breaststroke with a time of 2m 18.95s, breaking the mark of 2m 19.11s set by Denmark’s Rikke Moller Pedersen at the 2013 world championships in Barcelona.

It was the third world record at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre, the first two coming in women’s relays.

Russia’s Rylov thoroughly snuffed out America’s dominance in the backstroke, adding the 200m title to his victory in the 100m backstroke.

Rylov won with an Olympic-record time of 1m 53.29s, while American Ryan Murphy wound up with the silver (1m 54.15s).

Murphy was a double-gold medallist at the 2016 Rio Olympics, where he extended an American winning streak that began at the 1996 Atlanta Games.

The US won 12 straight men’s backstroke events over six Olympics, but that streak ended with Rylov’s victory in the 100m. He made it two from two in the longer race, while Murphy settled for bronze and silver in the two events.

Britain’s Luke Greenbank grabbed the 200m bronze in 1m 54.72s.

McKeon touched first in the 100m freestyle with an Olympic-record time of 51.96s, becoming only the second woman to break 52 seconds in the sprint.

Hong Kong’s Siobhan Haughey earned the silver in 52.27s, while another Aussie, Cate Campbell, took the bronze in 52.52s.

The Australians have won four individual women’s events at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre, in addition to setting a world record in a 4 x100m freestyle relay that included McKeon and Campbell.

The Americans claimed the other two medals behind Schoenmaker.

Lilly King set a blistering pace early in the race and held on for a silver in

2m 19.92s, adding to her bronze in the

100m breaststroke. Annie Lazor nabbed the bronze in 2m 20.84s.

Caeleb Dressel set another Olympic record in the semifinals of the 100m butterfly.

Minutes after Hungary’s Kristof Milak took down the mark in the first semifinal heat, Dressel went even faster with a time of 49.71s in the second heat.

It was the third-fastest time in history and left Milak as the secondfastest qualifier at 50.31s.

In the preliminaries, Dressel tied the former Olympic record of 50.39s set by Singapore’s Joseph Schooling to win gold at the 2016 Rio Games.

Dressel will be a big favourite in today’s final, though he could get pushed by Milak. The Hungarian already won the 200m butterfly with a dominating victory.

Dressel picked up the first individual gold medal of his career with a win in the 100m freestyle.