Ingrid Wilm extended Canada’s streak of medal podium finishes to a third straight day with bronze in the women’s 100-metre backstroke at the World Aquatics Championships in Doha, Qatar.
She battled Iona Anderson for silver down the stretch at the Aspire Dome on Tuesday, but the Australian touched the wall first in 59.12 seconds, 6-100ths ahead of Wilm.
The Calgarian finished less than a half-second off her 58.80 personal best from last year’s Canadian trials and 10-100ths of Australia’s Jaclyn Barclay in fourth.
American Claire Curzan, who qualified first for the final, won gold in 58.29.
The bronze is Wilm’s first individual long course (50m) world championship medal after the 25-year-old contributed to bronze by swimming the preliminary heats in 2022 (Budapest, Hungary) and last year in Fukuoka, Japan.
WATCH | Wilm collects bronze medal in women’s 100m backstroke:
Calgary’s Ingrid Wilm claimed the 100-metre backstroke bronze medal, at the 2024 World Aquatics Championships in Doha on Tuesday.
“I think it’s a great starting off point for this Olympic year,” Wilm said in a post-race interview. “For me, personally, it’s pretty exciting to get my first individual medal at the place where I started competitive swimming here in Doha, so it feels like a bit of a full circle moment right now.”
Elsewhere, Toronto resident Sophie Angus finished last in the eight-woman final of the 100 breastroke.
The 24-year-old’s time of one minute 7.09 seconds was nearly two seconds behind gold medallist Tang Qianting of China, who clocked 1:05.27.
Dutch swimmer Tes Schouten (1:05.82) and Hong Kong’s Siobhan Haughey (1:05.92) rounded out the podium.
WATCH | CBC Sports’ Devin Heroux, Brittany MacLean preview aquatics worlds:
Olympic medallist Sydney Pickrem – along with Taylor Ruck and rising star Ingrid Wilm – headline a Canadian team looking to make a splash when World Aquatics swimming runs Feb. 11-18.