Kate Douglass reacts to Gretchen Walsh breaking the 50m butterfly World record at the 2024 Short Course World Championships

Kate Douglass reacted to Gretchen Walsh's 50m butterfly performance on the first day of the 2024 Short Course World Championships. Walsh broke the world record in the event after clocking a time of 24.02 seconds during the heats.

At the back of this performance, Walsh bettered Swedish swimmer Therese Alshammar's record of 24.38 seconds. The 21-year-old will next look to set the deal with a medal in the following stages of the 50m freestyle event.

Douglass took to her Instagram handle to react to this impressive performance in her stories. She wrote:

"chill @gretchwalsh2"

Screenshot of Douglass' Instagram story (Image via: Douglass Instagram handle)

Douglass and Walsh competed together at the 2024 Paris Olympics where they were part of the quartet that clinched a silver medal in the Women's 4x100m freestyle event and also set a new American record by swimming in a combined time of 3:30.20.

Kate Douglass will also compete in the Short Course Swimming Championships, where she will compete in the 50m and 100m freestyle events 200m breaststroke and 200m Individual Medley. Notably, she also has a potent record in the 50m butterfly where she is currently third on the all-time list with a time of 24.42 seconds.

Gretchen Walsh opens up about her target in the 50m butterfly event breaking the world record in the heats

Walsh during the 50m freestyle finals on the ninth day of the 2024 Paris Olympics (Image via: Getty Images)

Gretchen Walsh opened up about her aspirations from the 50m butterfly event of the 2024 Short Course World Championships.

In an interview after the contest, Walsh opened up about her target to swim under 24 seconds in this event. She also mentioned that she has a lot of room to improve in the 50m butterfly races. She said (via SwimSwam at 00:16 onwards):

"I am looking forward to maybe going under that 24 (seconds) barrier tonight. I think I have a lot more to come in that race, just some details that I can tune up and executing it better. So I'm looking forward to semis and finals."

Consequently, during the semis of the event, Gretchen Walsh broke the world record she set in the heats again by swimming under 24 seconds (23.94). The finals of the event will take place on Wednesday (Dec 11) at 5:43 PM CET. Besides the 50m butterfly, Walsh is also slotted in to compete in the 100m butterfly and 50m freestyle events.