World Record Double-Double: When Kaylee McKeown and Regan Smith Both Swam Under a Record Twice in a Week
Women’s backstroke has belonged to Kaylee McKeown and Regan Smith since Smith broke world records in the 100 and 200-meter events at the 2019 World Championships. McKeown won silver behind Smith in the 200 at that meet, but two years later, when the world assembled for the delayed Tokyo Olympics, McKeown swept gold medals in both events to begin a long run of dominance.
Smith put together three strong seasons from 2023 through 2025, only to win eight silver medals in eight possible backstroke championship races. McKeown swept all three distances at the 2023 World Championships, the first woman to do so in any stroke, and then she edged Smith in the 100 and 200 at the Paris Olympics, then again at the 2025 World Championships.
For all of their matchups in high-stakes long course races, the two swimmers had never met in short course until the fall of 2025, when McKeown traveled to North America to race on the World Cup circuit. The seeds for those showdowns had already been building, though. McKeown actually broke her first world record in short course meters when she clocked 1:58.94 in the 200 back in November 2020. She added another top mark in the 100 with a time of 54.56 in September 2024.
Regan Smith — Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick
But the rest of 2024 saw Smith take charge of the events as McKeown sat out the remainder of the SCM season. During the swing of World Cup meets through Asia, Smith clocked 54.41 and then 54.27 in the 100, and she achieved a time of 1:58.83 to lower McKeown’s 200 record. Following that, Smith excelled at the Short Course World Championships in Budapest, sweeping the backstroke events while lowering world records in all three. Her times were 25.23 in the 50, 54.02 in the 100 and 1:58.04 in the 200.
Smith’s records in the 50 and 100 still stand; she equaled her own 100-meter record last fall. The 200, however, saw a massive jump when the two best backstrokers in the world got together. On two different occasions six days apart, both swimmers went under the existing standard.
The first of three meetings between McKeown and Smith in Carmel, Ind., was the only dud of the circuit. McKeown was already ahead by more than a second at the 150-meter mark, and she ended up winning in 1:58.86, slightly under her own best time, while Smith was more than a second back. When the series moved to Westmont, Ill., however, Smith stayed close to McKeown for the entire race and ended up closing the gap in the final strokes. In the end, the Australian got the better of the American by just four hundredths, with the women swimming the first two performances ever under 1:58: McKeown 1:57.87, Smith 1:57.91.
Both would go even faster at the final stop in Toronto. This race unfolded differently, with Smith leading at the halfway point with both swimmers under world-record pace, only for both to slow slightly on the third 50 as McKeown took the lead. McKeown blasted to the wall with a final 25-meter split of 14.68, resulting in a new world record by more than a half-second at 1:57.33. Moreover, that time was 1.61 seconds quicker than the first world record she set in the event five years earlier. Smith, for her part, finished that race in 1:57.86, a hundredth quicker than McKeown’s previous record.
Unfortunately for fans of high-level swimming competition, that would be the last time McKeown and Smith would go head-to-head for more than a year as illness would prompt McKeown to withdraw from the 2026 Pan Pacific Championships and Short Course World Championships. Smith already took advantage of McKeown’s absence at Pan Pacs to win her first long course international gold in the 200 back in seven years.
Moving into this fall season, Smith will again be poised to excel in short course meters, with the U.S. set for a rare SCM qualifying meet in late October before the global meet takes place in Beijing this December. We’ll see if she can reach one or more of those world records, but without McKeown in the mix, there won’t be anyone capable of joining Smith under world-record pace.