Artistic swimmer Hur Yoon-seo finishes 6th at worlds, top performance by S. Korean

Artistic swimmer Hur Yoon-seo finished sixth in the women’s solo free event at the world championships Wednesday, the best performance ever by a South Korean in her sport at the worlds.

Hur scored 186.6167 points for a small piece of South Korean swimming history at the World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka, Japan. The 17-year-old had finished fourth in Monday’s preliminary to reach the final, featuring the top 12 qualifiers.

Performing to music from the soundtrack of “Matilda,” Hur scored 103.8167 points in Execution, which measures technical elements, and earned 82.8000 points in Artistic Impression, which looks at choreography, presentation and transition, among others.

The previous best finish by a South Korean artistic swimmer at the worlds had been ninth — by Choi Yoo-jin in the women’s solo event in 1998 and by Lee Ri-young in the women’s solo technical event in Fukuoka last Saturday.

Yukiko Inui of Japan won her second straight world title with 254.6062 points. Vasiliki Alexandri of Austria won silver with 229.3251 points and Kate Shortman of Britain took bronze with 219.9542 points.

Also in Fukuoka, Hur and Lee teamed up to finish 13th in the preliminaries for both the duet technical and duet free events, just missing out on the finals open to the top 12 teams.