Summer McIntosh came within a whisker of breaking a long-standing world record and Leon Marchand failed to improve on a new mark he set just a night earlier, but both young guns won gold medals at the world championships in Singapore on Thursday.
Romania's David Popovici also flirted with a record on day five at the World Aquatics Championships Arena, the 20-year-old claiming a thrilling 100m freestyle gold to go with his 200 crown on day three.
The 200 butterfly world record of 2:01.81 set by China's Liu Zige in 2009 is the last surviving mark from the supersuit era in women's swimming and McIntosh all but took it down.
She stormed to her third individual gold medal of the meet in 2:01.99, the second-fastest swim of all time and a yawning three seconds better than American silver medallist Regan Smith.
Having made the last turn under world record pace the Canadian 18-year-old flagged slightly coming home and shouted an expletive when she spied the clock.