Swimming Canada – INDIANAPOLIS – Just over a month since her record performance at the Commonwealth Games, Taylor Ruck of Swimming Canada’s High Performance Centre – Ontario opened the next chapter in her season winning the women’s 100-m freestyle at a US Pro Swim event.

Ruck, the Pro Swim Series leader in the event, clocked 53.42 seconds – the fourth fastest time of her career. World champion Simone Manuel of the U.S. was second at 53.84 and her compatriot Margo Geer third in 54.40. Ruck clocked first at the turn and never relinquished her lead.

Two other Canadians were in the final. Kayla Sanchez was sixth in 54.62 and Rebecca Smith seventh in 55.27. Both are also from HPC-Ontario.

In the morning preliminaries, Ruck ranked second in 54.35 behind Manuel who swam a 54.20. Manuel was the co-Olympic champion with Canada’s Penny Oleksiak in 2016.

Last month, Ruck won eight medals at the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games. That tied Canada’s Ralph Hutton (1966) and Australians Emily Seebohm (2010) and Susie O’Neill (1998) for the most medals won by an athlete at a single Games. She also broke two Canadian records.

The 17-year-old from Kelowna, B.C. was also a double bronze medallist at the 2016 Rio Olympics as a member of the two freestyle relays.

Smith was also fourth in the 100-m butterfly on Thursday in 59.01.

Competition continues through to Saturday.

Full results: http://omegatiming.com/Competition?id=0001120101FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF&sport=AQ&year=2018