As 12-year-old Yu Zidi makes waves, swimming governing body to 'look at age rules'

At just 12 years old, Yu Zidi is making waves in international swimming circuit. The Chinese sensation is competing in her first-ever World Aquatics Championships in Singapore — becoming the second-youngest competitor in the event’s history — and has already delivered a performance well beyond her years.

In her debut race, the 200m individual medley, Yu finished fourth, missing out on a bronze medal by a razor-thin 0.06 seconds. Her time of 2:09.21 was more than a second faster than her previous best, and astonishingly, over nine seconds quicker than the U.S. girls’ national age-group record for 11-12-year-olds. She’s also faster than the boys’ record in that age bracket by three seconds.

Now, the governing body of swimming on Wednesday (July 30) said it would "have a look" at its entry policy following Yu Zidi's appearance at the world championships. Chinese schoolgirl Yu was 0.06sec short of securing a medal on Monday in Singapore and may still make the podium, with two of her more favoured events still to come.

The minimum age is 14 under World Aquatics regulations but younger competitors can qualify if -- as was the case with Yu -- they have met specific minimum standards. Brent Nowicki, its executive director, acknowledged they had been taken aback that someone so young as Yu had been sufficiently quick to qualify for the world championships.

"Our 'A' standards are so paper-thin, they're so narrow that I don't think I ever, in my head, perceived that it was a possibility that a 12-year-old merited such a period," he said in Singapore. "I feel quite comfortable with where we are with our safeguarding strategy within our sport."

But Nowicki conceded Yu might compel them to rethink. "She's terrific. I mean, there's a huge future there for her. Hopefully there might be some good things that might come out of this, and it might be terrific," he said. But he warned, “Obviously we have to ensure that that's what it is, right? We don't want to tip that balance and go the other way, and we have to be careful about that.” “We'll take a look and determine if we have to go further steps or if we're at a place we're okay with.”