Pan Pacific Championships Night One Finals: Ben Armbruster Wins 50 Fly
Three swimmers swapped the meet record in prelims at the Pan Pacific Championships on Wednesday morning. There was little separating them again at night.
Ben Armbruster led the way with a time of 22.75 seconds, a meet record. He pushed ahead of Van Mathias’ 22.84 for the United States, with Brazil’s Gui Caribe third in 22.88. All three were under the meet mark that Ambruster set in prelims at 22.92 at Irvine’s Woollett Aquatic Center.
Fourth place went to Michael Andrew of the U.S. in 22.99, with Isaac Cooper of Australia fifth in 23.02.
None of the times pushed the U.S. Open record set 15 days ago by Ilya Kharun in this same pool at 22.59 seconds.
The win sweeps up a stellar month for Armbruster, who tied countryman Kyle Chalmers for gold in 22.73 at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. That is the Australian and Oceania record (level with Matt Targett’s swim from 2009).
“I really was just trying to repeat what I did at Commies,” Armbruster said. “I had a good start and I finished really well. That is the first time I have done something like this (had a quick turnaround with big meets) and I wasn’t sure how my body was going to hold up. It is new territory, but I feel like I did really well.”
The Pan Pacs contingent is desperately trying to keep pace with the best of Europe in this event. Egor Kornev blasted a 22.36 in semifinals for Russia. Maxime Grousset has a 22.49 from prelims. Noe Ponti’s season-best is 22.53. All of those are faster than Kharun’s record. (Kharun’s switch of nationalities from Canada to the United States wasn’t finalized early enough last year for him to be selected to this meet.)
Chalmers and Armbruster are tied for 10th in the world since the beginning of 2026. That puts Ben Armbruster second among butterfly sprinting Armbrusters, behind Luca Armbruster of Germany.
Three swimmers set the meet record in the morning, with Mathias, Caribe and Armbruster all in the 22.9s, though that remains outside the top 15 globally this year. Santo Condorelli took it to the B final, winning it in 23.03, ahead of Chen Juner’s 23.34.
