World Aquatics World Cup #3 – Astana
There were 28 Crowns awards up for grabs entering the final stop of the 2026 Swimming World Cup Series in Astana, Kazakhstan. That included 10 on day 1, with 3 of those opportunities busted.
Those 3 busted crowns are already as many as we saw in the entire meet in the 2025 series finale in Toronto.
One of the busts was afforded by a shift in the event schedule for meet #3, which allowed Marrit Steenbergen to swim the 200 free. She won that race in a European Record of 1:50.23, which was faster than the 1:51.0s that Siobhan Haughey swam to win in each of the first two meets.
Steenbergen has the overall women’s title all-but-locked-up and the $100,000 bonus that goes with it.
The other crowns were busted when Cam McEvoy knocked off Egor Kornev in the men’s 100 free in the most anticipated battle of the weekend; and in the 200 fly where Japan’s So Ogata won in 1:49.89 when Chen Juner went his slowest finals time of the series to finish 2nd in 1:50.13.
Swimmers who successfully win an event at all three stops receive a $10,000 crowns bonus per event. If they win the same race at the Short Course World Championships in December, they receive an additional $20,000 bonus.
