Singapore's Tedd Chan smashes longstanding 50m backstroke national record at Asian Games

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21 Sep 2026 09:50AM

SINGAPORE: Seconds after touching the wall at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre on Monday (Sep 21), there was a huge smile on the face of 17-year-old Asian Games debutant Tedd Chan.

Not only had he massively lowered his personal best of 25.52s, Chan had broke a national record which had stood for over a decade, and qualified for the final of the men's 50m backstroke.

'I've never seen that (time) before," said Chan of his time of 24.97s. "I saw 24s and I was like 'that's not my name, there's no way it's my name'. And then I looked again, and it was my name."

Chan qualified fourth overall for the final behind China's Xu Jiayu, South Korea's Yoon Jihwan and China's Wang Zicheng, and will compete again later on Monday.

The previous national record stood 25.13s, set by Quah Zheng Wen at the 2015 FINA World Cup in Moscow.

"It's been a hard few months," he said. "Been working on sprint techniques, especially with my coach and performance people. It's been about a year around 25s, so it's a big personal best from 25.5s to 24s. Really proud of myself."

Singapore's swimmers have now set two national records after less than two days of competition. Earlier on Saturday, Gan Ching Hwee took silver in the women's 1500m, rewriting her previous national mark.