Leon Marchand and Kate Douglass Double on Final Night of Fort Lauderdale Open
When the psych sheets for the Fort Lauderdale Open were released, Leon Marchand was found in each of the four events he won at the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris. Over the weekend, Marchand was perfect again, as he left South Florida with victories in the 200-meter butterfly, 400 individual medley, 200 breaststroke and 200 IM. The triumphs in the 200 breast and 200 IM arrived on Saturday night.
As he prepares for this summer’s European Championships, Marchand opened her Saturday program by winning the 200 breaststroke over Jack Kelly, who claimed titles in the 50 breast and 100 breast earlier in the meet. But over four laps, Marchand had too much, his time of 2:09.04 more than three seconds faster than the 2:12.46 of Kelly. Marchand is the European-record holder at 2:05.85.
While the victory in the 200 breaststroke was convincing, Marchand had more work to do in the 200 medley, which featured battles with his training partners from the University of Texas pro group. Marchand emerged on top, thanks to a swim of 1:57.28, and was followed to the wall by Carson Foster and Hubert Kos in matching times of 1:57.95. Foster was also the runnerup in the 400 IM while Kos swept the backstroke events in Fort Lauderdale, the 100 backstroke title earned on Saturday night in 53.12.
Kate Douglass Doubles – Again
First-place finishes in the 100 freestyle and 100 breaststroke opened the Fort Lauderdale Open for Kate Douglass on Thursday night. She doubled again as the meet wrapped up on Saturday, this time grabbing wins in the 200 breaststroke and 50 freestyle. In the middle of those doubles, Douglass was the runnerup in the 50 fly.
Douglass showed why she is the reigning Olympic champion in the 200 breaststroke when she touched the wall in 2:20.94, the second-fastest swim of 2026. Only Great Britain’s Angharad Evans (2:19.70) has been quicker during the first months of the year. Douglass’ time was nearly four seconds faster than Ireland’s Mona McSharry, who placed second in 2:24.82.
For good measure, Douglass popped a winning time of 24.21 in the freestyle, an outing fast enough to defeat Gretchen Walsh (24.40), who was coming off a world-record effort in the 100 butterfly.
In Other Action…
Arizona State’s Ilya Kharun bested former Canadian teammate Josh Liendo in the 100 butterfly, as Kharun posted the only sub-51 performance in the field. Kharun stopped the clock in 50.87, which was quicker than the 51.17 of Liendo. Kharun is in the process of changing his sporting nationality to the United States, but he and Liendo were the bronze and silver medalists in the 100 fly at the 2024 Olympics.
The 50 freestyle went to Ralf Tribuntsov in 22.24. Ruslan Gaziev and Chris Guiliano tied for second in 22.27.