Taiwan's Eddie Wang breaks 200m fly short course world junior record

Taipei, Oct. 19 (CNA) Taiwanese swimmer Eddie Wang (王冠閎) broke the 200m short course butterfly world junior record at the opening meet of the 2020 International Swimming League (ISL) season in Budapest, Hungary on Saturday.

The 18-year-old who was representing the Cali Condors, a San Francisco-based professional swimming club and one of the ISL's original eight clubs, finished third in 1:50.79.

He finished behind winner Tom Shields of the LA Current (1:50.43) and runner-up Chad le Clos of Energy Standard (1:50.48).

Wang's time broke the 2012 world junior record of 1:51.30 set by former Japanese national team captain Daiya Seto. It also broke his Taiwan national record of 1:52.38 set at the 2018 FINA World Cup stop in Singapore, by 1.59 seconds.

It was the first world junior record by a Taiwanese swimmer.

Wang's coach Huang Chih-yung (黃智勇) said his athlete had not targeted the world junior record at the event which they were using as part of his training regime.

"Frankly, I'm surprised," Huang said, when asked about Wang's 1.59-second improvement.

Wang was born on Jan. 23, 2002. Under FINA rules for world junior records, swimmers are age-eligible through Dec. 31 of the year in which they turn 18. He joined the Cali Condors in early September and become the first Taiwanese swimmer in the ISL.