Record-breaking Summer McIntosh on path to emulate Michael Phelps and Katie Ledecky

The Hindu

2 days ago

Growing up in Toronto, Summer McIntosh chose her idols well.
She named the family cat, an orange tabby, Mikey, for Michael Phelps, the most decorated swimmer of all time. McIntosh's bedroom wall was covered with photos and inspirational quotes from Katie Ledecky, swimming's dominant queen with nine Olympic and 22 world titles.
Chasing GOATs
At 18, she is well on her way to joining them in the sport's pantheon — indeed, at the ongoing World Championships in Singapore, she is looking to equal a Phelps record and has already defeated Ledecky over 400 metres in the freestyle final.
Phelps is the only swimmer to have won five individual gold medals in a single edition of the World Championships. McIntosh, who hopes to compete in five individual events at the 2028 Los Angeles Games, is using this year's championships as something of a test run!
'I'm trying to see if I can do five events individually and how well I can do in them and how I can manage it... doing that run through now, three years out, is definitely something that will give me lots of confidence,' she said ahead of the Worlds' swimming portion, which began on July 27.
McIntosh arrived in Singapore after completing one of the greatest weeks in swimming history with a hat-trick of world records in June, becoming the first to set three different individual long-course records in one meet since Phelps in 2008. At the Canadian trials, she broke the world marks in the 200m and 400m individual medleys (IM), as well as the 400m freestyle.
ALSO READ | Divya, the girl who could become chess queen
Despite owning the 400 free world record, McIntosh had failed to win gold in the event at the Olympics or previous Worlds. She remedied that in ominous fashion, launching her packed programme with a statement win. The highly anticipated battle between McIntosh and Ledecky — an appetiser to the 800m freestyle — failed to materialise, as the Canadian led from start to finish and the American took bronze.
McIntosh had little time to savour her first major 400m triumph. The teen sensation exited quickly to prepare for the 200m IM semifinals, where she was again in a class of her own.
'While preparing mentally, I thought this was my biggest night of the whole meet,' she said. 'I've never done a double like that. And the 400m free, at past World Championships and Olympics, I haven't been where I wanted to be. So I'm really happy.'
Her joy doubled a day later, when she bagged a second gold, in the 200m IM. On Thursday, she completed a hat-trick of triumphs, clinching the 200m butterfly. The events remaining in her bid to equal Phelps will be swum this weekend: Saturday's 800m free and Sunday's 400m IM.
It's a gruelling schedule, especially when you add all the heats and semifinals. 'It means 14 or 15 races in eight days, demanding races,' Canada's head coach Iain McDonald said. Which of those races is her best event? 'She's such a versatile athlete, it's kind of tough to nail what her best events are,' McDonald said. 'She's pretty good right across the spectrum.'
Blockbuster main-event
There are no doubts, however, about which event the world is waiting for. McIntosh is coming for Ledecky's 800m crown, which the American has kept a tight grip on. In addition to four Olympic wins, Ledecky is hoping to become the first swimmer to claim seven world titles in a single event. In May, Ledecky improbably took down her nine-year-old world record from the 2016 Rio Olympics. But McIntosh represents a clear and present danger.
The 18-year-old came within two seconds of the 28-year-old's mark recently, signalling the chance that fans could soon see a changing of the guard. McIntosh famously ended Ledecky's 13-year unbeaten streak in the event in 2024, when she bested the American by nearly six seconds at a sectionals meeting in Orlando, Florida.
What's more, the rivalry doesn't faze her. 'Katie always brings the best out of me,' McIntosh said. 'Which is why I'm never nervous to race her.'
Ledecky, who won the 1500m freestyle gold in Singapore on Tuesday, is aware of the contender's prowess, but has been mentally preparing to meet an equal for years. 'I've always approached each race with a mindset that something like that could happen,' Ledecky once said. 'Even as that didn't happen for many, many years, I still maintain that approach.'
Irrespective of how the race goes, what is certain is that McIntosh will look at it as another learning opportunity. It's this desire to constantly improve, a trait common to great athletes, that has lifted her to soaring heights in a short career. She is never satisfied.
ALSO READ | Nikhat Zareen reiterates 'hunger to win medals' ahead of World Boxing Championships
After winning three gold medals at the Paris Olympics, McIntosh felt there was room for growth. Her attitude after breaking three world records in June was similar. 'Absolutely wild,' she said of the accomplishment, before promptly pointing to a litany of things she could improve on in each race, saying the self-criticism is part of her mission to keep testing the boundaries of her sport.
'I don't think there is such a thing as a perfect race, at least I haven't done it yet,' she said. 'I always want more. And I'm also still so young, I know I can get so much stronger.'
That competitive spirit runs deep in the McIntosh family. Her mother Jill competed at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics in swimming and older sister Brooke is a top pairs figure skater. 'We knew even at seven or eight years old that she was going to be an exceptional swimmer... beating 10 and 12-year-olds by a pool length,' her father Greg McIntosh said. 'She is a force of nature. She has been since she was a child.'
McIntosh's rapid journey to the pinnacle of swimming has taken her from Canada to Florida, where she trained with the Sarasota Sharks from 2022 and through the Paris Games. After the World Championships, she will begin training with Phelps' mentor Bob Bowman in Texas, as she builds to the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
Hunter and hunted
But even as she is hurtling towards greatness, McIntosh knows the wheel of sport will turn. Just as she is hunting down Ledecky, others will soon pursue her. In Singapore, a pre-teen Chinese swimmer showed she could be nipping at McIntosh's heels. Just 12, Yu Zidi created a sensation at the Worlds after missing the podium by only 0.06 seconds in the 200 IM.
Yu is recording faster times than McIntosh did as a 12-year-old, but the Canadian looks at it as further motivation. 'World records are made to be broken. So by the time I leave this sport, I want to make sure that [my] records are as fast as possible,' she said. 'I know there's always going to be the next generation of kids growing up, and they're going to be chasing the record. So I've got to give them my best effort to see how long it can stand.'