There's something in the water this weekend! Eamon Sullivan has just taken down Alexander Popov's world record over 50m freestyle, in 21.56sec. The time, 0.08sec inside the Russian sprint tsar's 2000 mark, was clocked at the New South Wales swimming championships today.

Sullivan, bronze medallist in the 100m freestyle at Melbourne 2007, shaved almost half a second off his best. 'I just surprised myself. I felt really, really good in the warm-up and working towards getting under 22 for the first time. I really don't know (what happened). We have made some big gains in the gym and I knew if I put bits of my best race together we would be in for a shot at the 22. To take that much off my PB is amazing.'

It certainly is. The sprint events in Beijing 2008 are far, far from being settled. Sullivan, the first Australian to hold the 50m record and the man who confined Popov to history after a 16-year reign that lasted three and a half years into the Russian's retirement, has catapulted himself from outside chance to title favourite. In the 100m too: Sullivan led off his club team 4x100m free in a Commonwealth record of 48.11 (off a 22.82 split), inside the 48.17 mark that had stood to Roland Schoeman (RSA), and inside the 48.18 at which Michael Klim had held the Aussie record since Sydney 2000 when leading the Dolphins to victory over the USA for the first time in Olympic history.