Relay teams both 13th as attention turns to Daniel Wiffen's 1500m final

Ireland's women’s and men’s 4x100m medley relays both finished in 13th position in this morning’s heats at the World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka, Japan, provisionally placing them within the 16 relay spots available for Paris 2024.

All eyes will be on the 1500m freestyle final at 12.16pm as Daniel Wiffen goes in search of world championship gold in his preferred event.

Wiffen, who set a new European record while finishing fourth in the final of the 800m on Wednesday, finished second in his heat on Saturday in a time of 14:43.50. The Down swimmer led for most of the race only to be edged out by America's Bobby Finke.

Fukuoka is the first opportunity for relays to qualify for the Games, with a second and final opportunity at the Doha 2024 World Championships, where teams can be moved up or down the rankings.

The women’s team of Danielle Hill (backstroke), Mona McSharry (breaststroke), Ellen Walshe (butterfly) and Victoria Catterson (freestyle) set a new Irish record when they combined for a time of 4 minutes 01.25 seconds. The quartet had held the previous standard of 4:02.93 from the 2021 European Championships.

The men’s team of Conor Ferguson (backstroke), Darragh Greene (breaststroke), Max McCusker (butterfly) and Shane Ryan (freestyle) came home in 3:35.03 to win their heat, just 0.41 outside of the Irish record of 3:34.62 set in 2021.