Tedd Chan celebrates after setting a national record in the Men's 50m Backstroke heats of the Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games 2026 at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre on Sep 21, 2026. (Photo: CNA/Wallace Woon)

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

The Games debutant qualified fourth overall for the final.

21 Sep 2026, 01:50 by Matthew Mohan · CNA · Join

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SINGAPORE: Seconds after touching the wall at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre on Monday (Sep 21), there was a huge smile on the face of 16-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.

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"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."

Tedd Chan during the Men's 50m Backstroke heats of the Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games 2026 at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre, Sep 21, 2026. (Photo: CNA/Wallace Woon)

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

"My senior Mikkel (Lee) told me to just have fun, I'm just going to do that tonight."

"NOTHING TO LOSE"

Singapore's swimmers have now set three national records after less than two days of competition.

On Sunday, Gan Ching Hwee took silver in the women's 1500m, rewriting her previous national mark. Gan's time of 8:29.56 for the first 800m of the race also broke the national record for the women's 800m freestyle.

In the men's 50m freestyle heats on Monday, Lee (22.30s) and Jonathan Tan (22.43s) qualified for the final in 8th and 10th position respectively. South Korea's Kim Youngbeom set a new Games record of 21.71s to top the heats.

"It's going to be a fast field tonight, great to have two Singaporeans in the final," said Lee.

Asked about Chan, Lee said that the youngster has got "nothing to lose" and that Singapore's swimmers are similarly in positions where they have "something to gain and nothing to lose".

"There's no point racing scared. Just go out there, have fun, we're going to move up. That's all that matters," he added.

There will also be a finals appearance for Games debutant Victoria Lim who qualified ninth for the 200m freestyle with a new personal best time of 2:03.72.

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

The Games debutant qualified fourth overall for the final.

"NOTHING TO LOSE"

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