‘F***': Teen star furious after winning gold medal
The 18-year-old sensation set a personal best on her way to recording the second-quickest time in the history of the 200m butterfly to take another gold medal, but it wasn't enough to satisfy her.
It was the Canadian's third gold medal at the Singapore meet.
McIntosh touched the wall in 2min 01.99sec, just failing to beat the world mark of 2:01.81 set by China's Liu Zige in 2009.
As soon as Mcintosh saw the time next to her name appear on the big screen, she looked ready to throttle someone.
The three-time Olympic gold medallist was visibly fuming and said 'f***' four times before finally exiting the pool.
You can watch her furious reaction in the video player above
Despite her best ever swim in the 200m butterfly, McIntosh looked devastated as she hung her head in her hands leaning on the side ropes.
It was only when she heard fans in the crowd cheering for her that a smile finally appeared.
The dominant win kept McIntosh on course to join retired great Michael Phelps as the only swimmers to win five individual titles at a single world championships.
It's why her angry reaction on Friday stunned many.
'That's the biggest reaction we've ever seen from Summer McIntosh,' Aussie icon Ian Thorpe said in commentary on Channel 9 before McIntosh dropped another F-bomb.
'And that was as well. We can see the disappointment.'
Aussie legend Ariarne Titmus said: 'I think she was absolutely going for that record.
'She should be stoked. She's the only other swimmer other than the world record holder to go under that 2mins 2sec mark. She was oh so close. I think she's forgetting that she's still won three from three world championship gold medals'.
Swimming GOAT Phelps was also watching on and posted on Instagram: 'It'll come Summer McIntosh. Love the reaction after'.
Leading Canadian sport journalist Devin Heroux posted on X from pool deck: 'Summer McIntosh is fuming.
'She just told me she's never felt that good in a final in her career. And she was so close to the WR.
'She told me she took one extra breath in the last metres and that was the difference. She is hungry for more. And told me she wants the 800m badly.
'I've never seen Summer McIntosh so disappointed and at the same time motivated after a race.
'My goodness she wanted that world record badly. That. Close. She'll be thinking about it for a while.'
Sports broadcaster Ben Seiner posted: 'There aren't many athletes out there who would be pissed to win a World Championships gold, but Summer McIntosh was today'.
Swimming commentator Bromine Zaddy posted: '2:01.99 is INSANE. Summer McIntosh is such a superstar it's almost dumbfounding. Just missed the WR… I'd be swearing too'.
She still has two more individual events to add to her medal haul, including an 800m showdown with swimming GOAT Katie Ledecky in one of the blockbuster events of the entire meet.
Ledecky is a four-time Olympic gold medallist and the world record holder in the 800m freestyle, but McIntosh clocked the third-fastest time ever last month.
American Regan Smith was second in 2:04.99, with Australia's Elizabeth Dekkers third in 2:06.12.
Chinese 12-year-old Yu Zidi was narrowly fourth in 2:06.43.
McIntosh, the 200m butterfly Olympic champion, has already won the 400m freestyle and 200m individual medley in Singapore.
'My coach and I, our big goal was to break that world record and that was what we were training for,' said McIntosh.
'To see that I missed it by that little — overall really happy with the time and PB (personal best), but I did not reach my goal tonight.'
The Canadian said her 200m butterfly performance 'gives me a lot of confidence'.
'Happy with the gold, happy with the win and just going to keep pushing for it,' she said.
Aussie phenom shows her class
Aussie marvel Mollie O'Callaghan on Thursday night joined Ian Thorpe as Australia's most successful swimmers at world championship-level when she anchored the Aussie team to gold in the 4x200m freestyle relay.
It was O'Callaghan's 11th gold medal. Thorpe (11 gold) and Grant Hackett (10) are the only other Aussies to win more than nine world championship gold medals.
O'Callaghan has done it at the age of 21.
Channel 9 commentators noticed O'Callaghan could barely keep her feet after exiting the pool and celebrating with teammates Lani Pallister, Jamie Perkins and Brittany Castelluzzo as they finished with a time of 7:39.35, ahead of USA in 7:40.01 and China (7:42.99) in third.
Pallister gave Australia a narrow lead off the first leg before the US team accelerated through the middle sector and with 250m of the race to go it looked like they would hand Ledecky a decent buffer.
But Castelluzzo stormed home to give O'Callaghan a small lead in her final battle with Ledecky.
O'Callaghan's gutsy final swim came just 90 minutes after she secured her spot in the 100m freestyle final in winning her semi-final.
'It was pretty rough backing it up after the 100 free … You can't really take it easy in the 100 free,' O'Callaghan said.
'I do it for the team, for the country. I know these girls put their whole work into this. It's a dream to be part of this team and I did it for these girls.'
She will start favourite in the 100m freestyle final on Friday night and will likely surpass Thorpe in doing so. Again, it cannot be stressed enough that the Queenslander only turned 21 in April.
'I think she will go far beyond 11,' Thorpe said on Channel 9.
He also said of O'Callaghan's 100m freestyle final: 'I look at her and I see the gold medal'.
King Kyle stunned in bonkers final
David Popovici on Thursday night pulled off the sprint double as he roared to gold in the men's 100m freestyle in a record-breaking time.
The Romanian won with a time of 46.51sec, with Jack Alexy of the United States taking silver (46.92) and Australia's Kyle Chalmers bronze (47.17).
Popovici also won the 200m free two days earlier.
The race was billed as a showdown between Popovici, Alexy and Chalmers, with all three qualifying for the final in fast times.
But Popovici took control over the second half of the race, streaking clear of his rivals to surge home in the second-fastest time ever.
The final was missing Olympic 100m freestyle champion and world record holder Pan Zhanle, who was eliminated after finishing 10th in the semi-finals.
Chalmers, 27, has never broken the 47-second mark and told Channel Nine after the event that he had been 'training hard' and 'desperately wanted to get a 46 out'.
'But to get on the podium is so special,' he added.
Chalmers had recorded a time of 47.36 in his semi-final, which was quicker than his 2016 Olympic gold medal effort and silver medal swim at last year's Olympics.
He did even better on Thursday night, but it wasn't enough after what Ariarne Titmus described in commentary as an 'unbelievable' swim from Popovici — and Chalmers echoed those sentiments.
'It's incredible. It was the fastest race in history to make it through that final, and I really believe that anyone could have won that race,' he said.
'We obviously didn't even have the world's record holder in that race, so it was amazing. 46.5 is insane. Crazy.'
Popovici's time was the second-fastest ever.
As pointed out by X profile @InsightLane, Chalmers has now raced in the 100m freestyle six times in global events and has never missed a spot on the podium.
Kyle Chalmers has raced the 100m freestyle final in 6 global events (Olympic Games/World Championships) over 9 years.
He has never missed the podium.
🥇 2016 OG
🥈2019 WC
🥈2021 OG
🥇 2023 WC
🥈2024 OG
🥉2025 WC #AQUASingapore2025
— InsightLane (@insightlane) July 31, 2025
Dating back to the Rio Olympics in 2016, King Kyle has collected six medals in the event with two gold medals, three silver medals and one bronze medal
That insane medal haul includes the 2021 Games in Tokyo where he was bested by just 0.06 seconds by American Caleb Dressel.
Elsewhere, French superstar Leon Marchand was unable to repeat his semi-final world record heroics in the men's 200m medley final but still took home gold with a time of 1:53.68.
The 23-year-old Paris Olympics hero wiped more than a second off Ryan Lochte's 2011 mark in Wednesday's semi-finals, setting a new best of 1min 52.69sec.
He did not reach the same level in the final but his title-winning time of 1:53.68sec was still the second-fastest of all time.
Marchand said he struggled to come down from the adrenaline rush of breaking the record in Singapore.
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