Cate Campbell’s world record survives assault from Sjostrom

Cate Campbell’s world 100m freestyle record has survived by 0.02 sec at the Mare Nostrum series in France.

Swedish star Sarah Sjostrom at the Rio Olympic Games last year, where she won gold in the 100m butterfly, silver in the 200m freestyle and bronze in the 100m freestyle. Picture. Phil Hillyard

Cate Campbell’s world 100m freestyle record survived an all-out attack from Swedish star Sarah Sjostrom by the barest margin at the Canet round of the Mare Nostrum series in France overnight.

Australia’s former world champion set the benchmark of 52.06 sec in a grand prix meet in Brisbane leading into last year’s Rio Olympics, taking down the supersuit time of 52.07 sec established by German Britta Steffen in 2007.

However Campbell’s time is now on notice after Sjostrom missed it by just 0.02 sec in Canet.

Sweden’s Olympic 100m butterfly champion, who took the bronze medal in the 100m freestyle in Rio, has re-emerged as an even bigger international threat this year after switching coaches during the off-season.

Under Therese Alshammar’s former coach Johan Wallberg, Sjostrom has dropped the 200m freestyle from her program this year and has been untouchable in the 50m and 100m freestyle and 50m and 100m butterfly leading into next month’s world titles.

By contrast Campbell has taken “long service leave’’ from the Australian team this year and is competing in Europe on about 80 per cent of her usual training load. She has opted out of the world titles.

But she was in the race to see Sjostrom threaten her record. She finished second in 53.03 sec, more than a second behind the rampant Swede.

If Sjostrom makes even minimal improvement in Budapest next month, she will annex that world mark.

There was better news for the national team elsewhere as backstroke diva Emily Seebohm completed a dominant tour with victory in the 100m backstroke in Canet.

Seebohm has been reinvigorated in the wake of her Olympic disappointment and subsequent surgery to address endometriosis and seems primed for a strong defence of her world titles in the 100m and 200m backstroke.

She showed signs of fatigue yesterday, after a week of racing, but still won the 100m comfortably in 59.57 sec.

Her fellow world champion Mitch Larkin rebounded from a defeat in the 200m backstroke in Canet, to win the 100m in 54.11 sec.

Commonwealth 200m breaststroke champion Taylor McKeown has also put together a strong series of performances in Europe, but she has been no match for the resurgent Russian Yulia Efimova, whose two doping suspensions made her a controversial figure at last year’s Rio Olympics.

Efimova is back in peak form, threatening the world records in both the 100m and 200m breaststroke in the last week.

She won the 200m yesterday in 2:20.15, less than a second outside the world record. McKeown was second in 2:24.41.

In the men’s 100m sprint, national champion Cameron McEvoy put together his best race of the series but couldn’t quite hold off France’s Meydy Metella, who won in 48.62 sec.

McEvoy dipped under 49 seconds for the first time on this trip (48.96sec) while dual world champion James Magnussen was third (48.99sec).

Olympic gold medallist Mack Horton was third in the 800m final in 7:54.53, coming off a win in the 1500m in Barcelona earlier this week.

Some of the Australians will now return home for another training period before the world titles, while others will continue on to this weekend’s Sette Colli Trophy meet in Rome.