Ten weeks removed from the conclusion of the 2025 World Aquatics Championships in Singapore, many of the world’s best swimmers will meet this weekend in Carmel, Indiana, a suburb north of Indianapolis, for the first stop of the 2025 World Aquatics Swimming World Cup.
The World Aquatics Championships in Singapore this past July and August was fast, based on the top eight and 16 times it took to advance to finals in certain events, an exciting sign for the sport as a whole and as we enter year two of the Olympic quad, this weekend’s World Cup meet will certainly set the tone for what’s to come, even with no global level long course meet on the horizon until the next World Aquatics Championships in Budapest in 2027.
This year’s World Cup is unique in that the first two stops of the three-leg tour will be held in the United States. This first weekend will be held in Carmel with the following in Westmont, Illinois, a suburb west of Chicago. It’s the first time the United States has hosted multiple stops of the World Cup in the same season, and with the 2028 Olympics coming to Los Angeles, the opportunity of racing in the United States is that much more crucial. Even if Carmel and Los Angeles are three time zones apart and completely different types of cities, the routine of traveling and racing will be important to establish.
“Performing at the World Cup in the United States, knowing that there’s a home Olympics this quad, is very exciting because I’ve never had an international swim meet in the United States before,” world record holder Regan Smith said. “I think it’ll be a very different vibe than what I’m used to. I’m grateful I get the opportunity to practice competing on American soil now, since this is what it will feel like before LA. I think the Carmel stop will be great and help shake the rust off and see how things go, and then the other two stops are going to be more focused on really getting excited about the crowd and thinking about how I’ll have this opportunity next summer at Pan Pacs and then again, hopefully, at the Olympics in 2028.”
In addition to the first two stops of the World Cup, the United States will host the Pan Pacific Championships in August 2026 in Irvine, a suburb southeast of Los Angeles, with the best of the best from Australia, Canada, and Japan, which will serve as an almost “testing ground” for what the atmosphere will look like for the American fans in Los Angeles. The American team is used to traveling, so having meets in its own backyard will be beneficial to those that train in the same time zone as Carmel.
“All the traveling we've had to deal with in these past few years has been pretty difficult for us and it's hard to always get up and race and train when we're dealing with jet lag,” 200m breaststroke world record holder Kate Douglass said. “I'm really excited to just kind of stay in the U.S. for two of these meets. I think that gives us a good opportunity to race fast. And I think hopefully, yeah, obviously leading up to a home Olympics, maybe that'll get more U.S. fans involved and excited about swimming. So we'll see if that happens.”
Coming off of the Paris Olympics, many of the conversations were about the size of the venue that hosted up to 17,000 spectators, and the noise of the ovations that the French athletes received. Many of the American swimmers in Paris took notice of the cheering from the French crowd, salivating at the idea of that being amplified for them in the proposed 38,000 seating capacity in SoFi Stadium come Los Angeles 2028.
This weekend’s World Cup will be the first opportunity for the American athletes to race an international meet on home soil, and a chance to show the rest of the world a taste of what is to come in 2026 and most importantly 2028.
“I think that these meets are extremely important for me and the American fans because swimming is not a huge sport in America,” Regan Smith said. “We’re trying to generate more excitement and more revenue for the sport, so we need to spread the word and make sure our sport is more interesting. I think the World Cups are so much fun and can really get the crowd excited. These meets are fast paced, and John Mason is an excellent host. He does a really good job of getting the crowd excited and the World Cup puts on more of a show. I’m really hoping that people do a good job of spreading the word and hopefully come to watch in person. I think fans will be pleasantly surprised at how interesting it is.”
The World Cup format is unique to that of a World Championships or Olympics. Rather than an eight or a nine day programme, all the racing is done in three days - one heat at night in each event with big time prize money on the line. Major bonuses are in play for any athlete who wins the same race at all three stops, colloquially known as the “triple crown,” and for any athletes who break a world record.
“I hope that the fans bring the great energy that I know they are capable of,” world record holder Luke Hobson said. “The World Cup format is exciting and something that fans can really get behind. The louder and more exciting the fans are the faster we can all swim. There is no better feeling than walking out for your race and hearing the roar of a home crowd.”
For Paris Olympians Alex and Aaron Shackell, it’s an opportunity to showcase their brand new training facility and “Swim City USA” as the town has been dubbed after Carmel Swim Club has consistently been one of the top producers of 18 & under talent in the United States, including fellow Olympians Jake Mitchell and Drew Kibler.
“Carmel has done so much, not only for Aaron and I, but so many other athletes,” Alex Shackell said Wednesday night. “So there's a big legacy at Carmel. The city itself is named Swim City. So it just makes sense to have an international meet here. I'm really excited to see what they put up because there's a lot of potential. There's a lot of stands and a lot of space now with our extra pool. So I'm excited.”
The American die hard fans will get a chance to see their favorites in action from the likes of last year’s World Cup overall champion Kate Douglass, as well as last year’s darling of the World Short Course Championships Gretchen Walsh, and last year’s men’s World Cup champion and the hero of the Paris Olympics, Leon Marchand of France.
“I think I'm super excited to see what kind of energy the American fans are gonna bring here. I think it's cool to know that a lot of the fans will be here to kind of root on the U.S. swimmers, like me and Reagan (Smith) and hopefully a bunch of our friends. And I think that'll be fun to see them get excited to see us race. I feel like last year there were a lot of fans in Asia, but I feel like none of them were really cheering for us. And so I feel it's cool that everyone's going to be here just cheering us along. And I'm hoping that maybe seeing us race and seeing their excitement during the three stops (in North America) at the World Cup will help get more people excited about swimming. I feel like that's kind of what we need in this sport leading up to a home Olympics (in Los Angeles). We need to get people engaged, get them involved, and maybe the Swimming World Cup events is a good way to do it. So I think we'll just have to see if people get really, involved and excited after seeing the racing that we put on.”
Coming off of 29 medals at the World Aquatics Championships this past summer in Singapore, this is the first racing opportunity for many of the American athletes, with a chance to start fresh. The acute gastroenteritis illness that affected the team in Singapore is a thing of the past, and the Americans are ready to showcase the work that was put in before those championships. After a disappointing team performance at the Paris Olympics, numerous changes were made to the structure of USA Swimming, including the hiring of new CEO Kevin Ring and new National Team Director Greg Meehan, the former coach of Olympic gold medalists Maya DiRado, Katie Ledecky, Simone Manuel and Torri Huske.
“Most of the time the fall season after an international meet consists mainly of training, but this year is a little different for me because of the World Cup meets,” Hobson said. “This circuit is a great way to get back into racing after some heavy training and really set the tone for the rest of this year. It’s always great to start the season with racing, so I can learn from and use to fine tune my skills for the next couple of years.”
The World Cup will get started Friday morning at 10:00 a.m. local time with finals following at 6:00 p.m. each night.
Contributing: Gregory Eggert