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2023 World Championships is back! On January 13, World Aquatics released the competition calendar, which will be held in Fukuoka, Japan, with a significant adjustment from the Budapest-hosted event the year before.
The 2023 World Championships will take place from July 14 to July 30, with artistic swimming and diving and ending on July 23 with pool swimming.
With the TYR Pro Championships from July 26 to July 29, a new event added to USA Swimming's domestic calendar this year now directly clashes with the pool swimming schedule.
2023 World Championships complete swimming schedule
The Fukuoka 2023 World Championships were originally slated to take place in May 2022, however, World Aquatics (formerly FINA) announced the inclusion of the Budapest World Championships in the summer of 2022 when COVID-19 forced the meet to be postponed until July 2023.
Pool Swimming, which moved ahead of its first week in Budapest last year, will once again take its usual place in the second week of the 17-day competition.
The two showpiece sports are back in their usual locations in Fukuoka after pool swimming took place in the first week and diving in the second week of competition in Budapest.
The men's 400 IM was noticeably moved to the first day last year, but otherwise, the schedule for the pool event is the same as it was in Budapest.
After being absent from the Budapest World Aquatics Championships, high diving will also be back for a fifth time.
Preliminaries will begin at 10:30 am and finals will begin at 8:00 pm local time in Fukuoka. In the Eastern time zone, that translates to prelims starting at 9:30 pm the previous evening and finals starting at 7:00 am the following day.
Dates of 2023 World Championships (July 14-30)
- Diving: July 14-22
- Artistic Swimming: July 14-22
- Open water swimming: July 15-20
- Water Polo: July 16-29
- Pool swimming: July 23-30
- High Diving: July 25-27
Venues of 2023 World Championships
- Diving: Marine Messe Fukuoka Hall A
- Artistic Swimming: Fukuoka Prefectural Pool
- Open water swimming: Seaside Momochi Beach Park
- Water Polo: Marine Messe Fukuoka Hall B
- Pool swimming: Marine Messe Fukuoka Hall A
- High Diving: Seaside Momochi Beach Park
History of Fukuoka
The World Aquatics Championships will be held in Fukuoka for the second time. Fukuoka hosted the event for the first time in 2001. That year's competition saw a number of noteworthy performances, including Ian Thorpe setting new world records in the men's 200, 400, and 800 free, Grant Hackett setting a record in the men's 1500 free (14:34.56) that would stand for a decade, and Michael Phelps winning his first world title with a new world.
Marine Messe Fukuoka Hall A, which saw some of the most legendary performances in history at the 2001 World Aquatics, will host the pool program.
Twenty-one years later, Thorpe's time of 3:40.17 for the 400-meter freestyle stands fourth all-time, only 0.01 behind then Paul Biedermann's super-suited world record of 3:40.07, which the German lowered at the 2009 World Aquatics.
Third place goes to Sun Yang's 3:40.14 time from London 2012. With a time of 7:39.16, Thorpe has the fourth-fastest time in history, while his 1:44.01 is ranked thirteenth.
In the 100-meter backstroke, Natalie Coughlin also won her first international championship; she went on to win 12 Olympic championships and an additional 19 long-course gold medals.
In a competition that featured several notable athletes like Yana Klochkova, Kosuke Kitajima, Aaron Piersol, Grant Hackett, Petria Thomas, Inge de Bruijn and Anthony Ervin won their respective 50 and 100 free pairs.
