Summer McIntosh takes on new challenge at 2025 World Aquatics Championships

If you enjoy puns, get ready for the likely return of the fan favourite headline, “It’s the Summer of Summer!” when the pool swimming events get started at the World Aquatics Championships in Singapore on July 26.

As she did the last two years prior, 18-year-old Summer McIntosh has ratcheted up the excitement for the World Aquatics Championships by laying down world record performances at the meet to select the Canadian team.

At the 2025 Bell Canadian Swimming Trials, which took place in Victoria in June, McIntosh lowered an astonishing three world records in a five-day span.

McIntosh kept to her tradition of lowering the 400m IM world record at the Canadian Trials. In April 2023, McIntosh was the first swimmer to go sub-4:26 to take the record ahead of the 2023 World Aquatics Championships. At the Trials in May 2024, McIntosh became the first swimmer to go sub-4:25 in the event, just ahead of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. This June McIntosh became, you guessed it, the first swimmer sub-4:24, swimming 4:23.65 to lower her own world record ahead of the 2025 World Championships.

READ: What you need to know about Team Canada at the 2025 World Aquatics Championships

In the 200m individual medley at the 2025 Trials, McIntosh took down a nearly 10-year-old world record set by Hungary’s Katinka Hosszú at the 2015 World Championships.

In the 400m freestyle, McIntosh took back the world record from Australian swimmer Ariarne Titmus. McIntosh had swum 3:56.08 at the 2023 Canadian Trials to take the world record from Titmus, before Titmus reclaimed it at the 2023 World Championships. At this year’s Trials, McIntosh lowered the mark by more than a second to 3:54.18. 

And McIntosh was dangerously close to an additional world record in the 200m butterfly at the Trials. McIntosh clocked in at 2:02.26, just 0.45 seconds from Liu Zige’s 16-year-old world record of 2:01.81—set within the era of the now-banned supersuits.

While the bevy of world records certainly indicate that McIntosh is in top form, there’s no saying what will happen in the pool in Singapore—and that’s an element that the teenager embraces.

“I think the fun of the sport is not knowing how fast you’re going to swim at a meet,” said McIntosh during a pre-worlds media availability. “Those unknowns are really fun.” 

McIntosh’s goal for the meet is crystal clear though: “to get as many golds as possible.”

Even with her busy schedule of five individual events (400m IM, 400m free, 200m IM, 200m butterfly, 800m free), McIntosh is likely to appear on Canadian relay teams as well.

“I’ll do whatever it takes to get the medal count as high as possible,” she said.

Five events on deck

The 800m freestyle is back in  McIntosh’s individual programme four years after she last swam it at a major international long course meet—her Olympic debut at the delayed Tokyo 2020. 

So, as McIntosh said, there is that level of unknown as to how hard she can push within close quarters racing against the world’s best.

The matchup between McIntosh and American superstar, Katie Ledecky, makes the 800m freestyle one of the most highly anticipated races of the world championships. The last six iterations of the women’s 800m world record—dating back to 2013—have belonged to Ledecky. McIntosh is the only swimmer to ruin Ledecky’s hold on the top 10 times ever in the event, clocking in third fastest all time at this year’s Trials. 

The challenge of racing Ledecky is one of the factors that influenced McIntosh to add the 800m freestyle as her fifth event.

“Any time I get to race Katie, it’s a learning experience and it’s always a good race,” said McIntosh.

While McIntosh wants to swim five individual events at the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games, there’s no guarantee that the 800m freestyle will be the addition she settles on. While she’s testing out the long distance event, she may pivot to the 200m backstroke or 200m freestyle.

“LA is always in the back of my mind, and my goal for there is to do five events. So, doing that run through now three years out is definitely something that will give me lots of confidence,” said McIntosh.

An evolving Summer

McIntosh has already made some changes since last year’s Parisian Summer of Summer, which saw her win three Olympic gold medals (400m IM, 200m butterfly, 200m IM) and one silver (400m free).

For the last few months McIntosh has been training with coach Fred Vergnoux in the south of France, an experience McIntosh says has taken her “to the next level in the sport” already within a short period of time—a tall order when it comes to an athlete that is a quadruple Olympic medallist at 18.

McIntosh is particularly keen to showcase the work she’s been doing with Vergnoux in her distance freestyle events. Despite being the world record holder, McIntosh has yet to win gold in the 400m freestyle at a major championship.

“I think going into past big meets, I haven’t had the confidence in my training and in my freestyle in general, technique-wise and endurance-wise, that I have now,” said McIntosh. “Fred has really pushed me to the next level in my freestyle, and having the endurance to finish an 800m has definitely also helped my 400m.”

One of the biggest changes is yet to come for McIntosh, who is set to join coach Bob Bowman’s training group in Austin, Texas after the world championships.

Bowman coaches the Paris 2024 hometown hero Leon Marchand, who won four individual gold medals at the Games. But Bowman is best known for having honed American swimmer Michael Phelps into the most successful Olympian of all time. Phelps has a record 28 Olympic medals, including 23 golds. For McIntosh, Phelps was her childhood idol.

After her record breaking performance at the Canadian Trials, McIntosh was pulled out of practice by retired Olympic swimmer and CBC reporter Brittany MacLean with a cryptic, “someone wants to talk to you!” Handing McIntosh the phone, it was none other than Phelps on the line.

“I was in utter shock,” McIntosh said as she described the moment. “It was really cool to talk to my childhood idol–-he’s still my idol! It definitely gave me more motivation to keep doing what I’m doing for sure.”

It was a charming moment to watch an athlete, whose meteoric rise through the world of swimming has inspired so many, be ecstatic about chatting with her own childhood hero, with whom she will soon share a coach. And it is not hard to imagine that, years from now, a call from Summer McIntosh could be a core memory for a talented young swimmer.

Tune in to CBC to watch McIntosh and all of Team Canada’s swimming, water polo, diving, and artistic swimming athletes compete at the 2025 World Aquatics Championships. Let this year’s Summer of Summer begin.