Noe Ponti shatters men's 50m butterfly at World Championships (25m)

Noe Ponti of Switzerland won the men's 50-meter butterfly gold medal by breaking the world record of the event in 21.32 seconds at the World Aquatics Swimming Championships (25-meter) in Budapest, Hungary, on Wednesday.

The previous record of 21.43 seconds was set by Ponti in the semifinals and he improved it by another 0.09 second in the final.

Ilya Kharun of Canada earned silver in 21.67 seconds, followed by the bronze medalist Nyls Korstanje of the Netherlands who finished the race in 21.68 seconds.

Multiple athletes broke the championship record (CR) of their events to either win the title or advance to the final on the day. Regan Smith of the U.S. finished the women's 100-meter backstroke final in 54.55 seconds, which beat the CR, 54.93 seconds by her compatriot Katharine Berkoff and 55.75 seconds by Ingrid Wilm of Canada.

Lani Pallister of Australia dominated the women's 800-meter freestyle final in 8:01.95, setting a new CR and defeating Isabel Gose of Germany who finished the competition in 8:05.42 and Katie Grimes of the U.S. who did it in 8:05.90.

Gretchen Walsh of the U.S. beat the women's 100-meter freestyle CR in the semifinals in 50.49 seconds. She was 1.58 seconds faster than Freya Anderson of Britain, the only other qualifier of her group. The other six finalists earned their spots in the other race, led by Beryl Gastaldello of France who finished it in 51.56 seconds.

Tang Qianting of China reached the women's 100-meter breaststroke final after breaking the Asian record in 1:02.37. She was only 0.01 second behind the world record of 1:02.36 kept by Alia Atkinson of Jamaica.

China's Qin Haiyang advanced to the men's 100-meter breaststroke final after finishing the semifinals in 56.04 seconds, the second-best of all finalists, behind only 56.02 seconds by Kirill Prigoda of Russia.