Teens Popovici and McIntosh grab world swimming golds as Dressel quits

David Popovici, a 17-year-old, collected his second gold medal of the Swimming World Championships on Wednesday, while 15-year-old Summer McIntosh won her first as US star Caeleb Dressel quit the tournament for "medical reasons".

Popovici claimed victory in the men's 100m freestyle and McIntosh won the women's 200m butterfly.

In the other individual finals, Frenchman Leon Marchand completed the men's medley double in the 200m and Kylie Masse won a second Canadian double gold when she took the 50m women's backstroke.

In the women's 200m relay that ended the evening, the United States won gold, Australia took silver and Canada, with McIntosh collecting a second medal of the day, held on for bronze.

The evening had opened with a thunderclap when the US team announced that seven-time Olympic gold medallist Dressel, who had already scratched from the 100m free final, was quitting the championships for an unspecified medical reason. 

Popovici, who had become the first Romanian man to win a world title when he won the 200m free, collected the 100m with a late surge.

"I'm a bit prouder of the 200m win, still this was great too," he said. "Now I get to rest a little even though standing on my feet," he added.   "I feel good, I'm glad to have got two golds now, I think it will be pretty heavy carrying them."

McIntosh, a Canadian, broke the world junior record as she added the 200m butterfly to the silver she had won in the 400m freestyle on the opening day.

"It's one of my biggest dreams in the swimming world to be world champion and especially to do it in 200 fly...it is one of my favourite events," she said.

Popovici started the last lap trailing Canadian Joshua Liendo but accelerated past and then out-battled Frenchman Maxime Grousset