International racing was back for Mary-Sophie Harvey, Sophie Angus and Ingrid Wilm, who took part in the 2024 World Aquatics Swimming World Cup. The series, which had stops in Shanghai, Incheon, South Korea, and Singapore wrapped up over the weekend with the trio capturing a total of 17 medals across all three stops.
The series kicked off in Shanghai, a city that has hosted the 2006 World Swimming Championships (25m) and the 2011 World Aquatics Championships.
Harvey, who finished fifth overall in the series, won the 400-metre individual medley in Shanghai, clocking in at 4:28.03 and added silver in the 200-m freestyle with a best time of 1:53.36 behind Hong Kong’s Siobhan Haughey (1:51.46). Ingrid Wilm also earned Canada’s first medals in backstroke events, taking bronze in both the 50-metre and 100-m backstroke.
“After the Olympics people struggle a little bit, and I was one of them to get back into training at some point,” explained two-time Olympian Harvey, who had four fourth-place finishes at the Paris 2024 Games including relays. “I think racing straight away was a really good move on my part because I get excited for the season ahead and am excited to go back to training.”
Incheon, South Korea, hosted the second stop of the series, marking its debut as a World Aquatics event host.
Harvey added to her medal tally, clinching gold medals in the 400-m freestyle with a personal best time of 3:56.78 and 400-m individual medley in 4:26.23. She also added a silver in the 200-m IM (2:05.23) behind China’s Yiting Yu (2:04.73) and a bronze in the 100-m IM.
Wilm, meanwhile, was top three in all three backstroke events. She captured silver in the 50-m in 26.09 behind Regan Smith from the United States who won in 25.71, along with the 100-metre backstroke in 56.14 behind Smith again who set a world record in the event going 54.41. In addition, Wilm finished third in the 200 for her third bronze of the series. Sophie Angus earned her first medal of the series with a bronze in the 100-m breaststroke, going 1:05.41.
The final stop took place in Singapore, a city set to host the 2025 World Aquatics Championships and known for previously hosting the World Aquatics Junior Swimming Championships in 2015 and the Youth Olympic Games in 2010.
Harvey concluded her World Cup racing schedule with three more silver medals in the 400-m freestyle in 3:58.21 behind Katie Grimes from the United States, 400-m IM in a personal best time 4:25.33 which was 1.14 seconds behind Grimes and 200-m IM in another best time touching in 2:04.82 behind Yu.
“It’s super nice to drop some time,” said Harvey, who swims for Montreal’s CAMO club. “The last time I went a best time in 400 free and 400 IM was 2016. So, eight years later as I’m getting older, it’s quite nice and gives me confidence. Heading into Worlds in December, it just strengthens my confidence and gets me excited for the season ahead.”
The series saw intense competition from the USA, with Kate Douglass narrowly taking the overall title by a margin of 0.1 points over American teammate Smith. Both set world records during the series. Haughey rounded out the podium with 160.7 points, just ahead of Harvey, who finished fifth with 157.8 points.
Wilm added to her tally with bronze medals in both the 50-m going a best time of 25.98 and 100-m backstroke finishing in the Top 10 overall. Angus rounded out the Canadian trio finishing 17th overall with best times in all three breaststroke events at the final stop of the series.
“The World Cups were such a great experience for me,” said Angus, a Paris Olympian who trains at the High Performance Centre – Ontario. “I haven’t raced a ton of short course metres, so to have the ability to race three weekends in a row, learn from each race and build on it a few days later allowed me to really progress my times. I was able to continually get faster as the stops went on and set a lot of new personal bests. Racing each of my events six times let me try new strategies without a lot of pressure and really figure out how I want to swim my races next month in Budapest.”
Harvey led with nine medals (three gold, five silver, one bronze), followed by Wilm with seven (two silver, five bronze) and Angus with one bronze.
Walking away from the series will give all three athletes momentum heading into the 2024 World Aquatics Swimming Championships (25m) next month. They will join the rest of team Canada in Budapest for the championships with racing on Dec. 10 to 15. Full team roster can be found here.
Media contact:
Nathan White
Associate Director, Communications
nwhite@swimming.ca