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This week’s Performance Of The Week, sponsored by LumaLanes, goes to Cate Campbell, who continued her impressive rise back to the top of the international ranks with a new best time in the 100 free at last week’s Pan Pacific Championships.
Campbell’s ascent back to the top of the world rankings has been well documented this year, and any doubters still out there had to be silenced this week after her performances at Pan Pacs. The 26-year-old Australian was the standout performer at last week’s meet in Tokyo, winning five gold medals and making history in the 100 free.
While Campbell’s first ever sub-51 second 100 free relay split is something to be celebrated (you can read more about here), she was able to back that up with the second fastest flat-start performance in history. Clocking in at 52.03, she broke her own Commonwealth Record of 52.06 that she set in the lead-up to the Rio Olympics.
What makes Campbell’s performance even more impressive is that this was her second major international meet of the summer, and presumably her third major rest meet in the last four months.
And while Sarah Sjostrom still has the world record and remains the only woman to swim under 52 seconds in the event, Campbell did earn the top time in the world this year and swam almost a full second faster than Sjostrom’s winning time of 52.93 in the finals at European Championships just two days earlier.
Congratulations Cate Campbell on earning Swimming World’s Performance of the Week!
Special Thanks to LumaLanes for sponsoring Swimming World’s Performance of the Week.
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It’s interesting what cortisone shots and an inhaler will do for a gal. Campbell’s first good swim since 2013 but sadly still just third in the world in the 50 Free. She sets her own personal bar quite low while trash talking against Team USA.
Unfortunately for Cate, it is very apparent that Blume and Sjostrom have blown past her as the class of the world sprint field. She is tall and she is the mouth that roars, but that’s about it.
Anyone who knows Cate knows that she is one very hefty glass of insecurity. Given her middling 50 Free (3rd in world) and her one decent swim at PP–really her first in 5 years–it was kind of sad to see her post-meet comments that Team USA was “put on notice.” The gold medal count was USA 18, Australia 8. There were certainly a lot of finer swims and overall performances than Cate’s at Pan Pacs, Kalisz, Murphy, Ledecky, Masse, Ohashi and others come to mind, and they were carried off with a lot better sportsmanship.
Go Cate Campbell my favourite Swimmer.. ?♀️?♀️
Cate Campbell is an injury-riddled has-been, lacking in grace, who will apparently look back bitterly on the 2016 Olympics for the rest of her life with a big “what if”. Her post-meet comments about Team USA were so out of line that I don’t know how her teammates and coaches put up with it.