McAllen native Shaine Casas advanced to today’s 200-meter backstroke finals of the 19th FINA World Championships in Budapest.
The former McAllen High and Texas A&M standout first won his heat in 1 minute, 56.66 seconds, .19 seconds ahead of Australia’s Joshua Edward Smith. He was .30 seconds ahead of Team USA teammate and Olympian gold medalist Ryan Murphy in the fourth heat of the day. The top four in each of the four heats advanced to the semifinals.
In the semifinals, Murphy dropped the lowest time of the day with a 1:55.43 to earn the top ranking going into today’s medal-round race, which was scheduled to take place at 12:01 a.m. Eastern Time, 8:01 a.m. Budapest time. Casas held the sixth-best time in the semifinals with a 1:56.90. The top four finishers in each of the two semifinal races advanced to today’s race.
Casas, 22 years old, is a six-time world championship medalist and three-time NCAA champion. After a disappointing showing at the U.S. Olympic Trials, Casas earned a spot for Team USA in the Short Course Meters World Championship in Abu Dhabi, held in December 2021.
He reached the finals in all eight of the events he competed in, winning medals in six of them, including gold in the 100 short course meter back and the 4×50 short course medley relay. He also snagged three silver and one bronze.
Casas qualified for the team during the World Championship Trials in Greensboro, N.C. in the 200 backstroke. His time of 1:55.57 in the prelims of the 200 back was the fastest time in the world at that point. In the finals, Murphy, a four-time gold medalist, turned in a time of 1:55.01 to take over the top spot in the world. Meanwhile, Casas improved on his prelims time, finishing in 1:55.46, the then-second-fastest time in the world. Murphy’s semifinal time Wednesday is now the second-fastest time in the world this year.
Casas, who left A&M and turned pro earlier this year, barely missed on qualifying for the Tokyo Olympic Games and took two months off of “doing nothing.” following what he calls the first complete failure of his stellar swimming career.
“I really had no experience in how to deal with that failure and that whole process changes any person. After that, I realized that I was doing this wrong,” Casas said to The Monitor in May. “I decided to just get back in shape mode. Whenever you have a goal with no purpose, it’s going to be hard to get to that goal. For a good bit of time I felt that I had lost that fire.”
Since his return, Casas has regained that fire and intensity to swim, compete and win.
“Maybe the biggest reason I’m happy is that I have more time to focus on who I am and why I love the sport so much,” he said. “I’m confident and my mental state is good. Life for me is swimming. It’s not about fame or clout. I’m swimming now because I want to. I want to win.
“Now I need to focus on the details and make sure my mental game is good, put it together and beat 99% of the other swimmers out there.”
