Ali Thameem
For the third time in thirteen months, seventeen-year-old Looth Mohamed Hussain has improved the men’s 50m national breaststroke record.
Looth broke the record this morning at the Asian Games in Aichi-Nagoya 2026, competing in heat 1 of the 50m breaststroke event. Looth finished 7th in 30.98 seconds, just 1.70 seconds behind the heat winner, David Akopyan of Turkmenistan.
This was a 0.83s improvement on the heat’s national record since Looth first broke it in Romania in August 2025. He went on to shorten it to 31.54s at this year’s 23rd Commonwealth Games, before renewing it once again at this Asian Games.
The 50m breastroke’s all-time best result (26.25) at the Asian Games was produced in Hangzhou, China, by Chinese national Qin Haiyang. The heat’s World Record of 25.95 is held by British swimmer Adam Peaty for the past nine years.
Together with the 50m, the teenager Looth currently holds two other breastroke national records; 100m and 200m.
The Maldives swimming team has now set three national records at these Asian Games. Alongside Looth’s new record today, 19-year-old Mohamed Rihan Shiham broke the 400m individual medley record, before Meral broke the women’s record in the 100m breaststroke.
With this morning’s heats, the events in which Maldivian swimmers participated in the 20th Asian Games have come to an end. The team will return to the Maldives tomorrow.
