Daiya Seto is a hot World Champ IM Swimmer from Japan

Daiya Seto is a Japanese competitive swimmer who swims in the individual medley, butterfly, breaststroke, and freestyle events. At the World Short Course Championships in 2012, he won the gold medal in the 400 meter individual medley. This would turn out to be the meet where Seto would win his first international medals of his career. He first competed in the 400 m individual medley, where he won his first World Championship title by coming in first with a new Asian record of 3:59.12, over a second and a half faster than second place finisher László Cseh.

Born: May 24, 1994 (age 21), Moroyama, Saitama Prefecture, Japan
Height: 5' 9"
Weight: 159 lbs

Despite coming in as a short course World Champion, Seto was still coming into the championships relatively unknown, mostly due to Japanese medley star Kosuke Hagino. He once again came in with the schedule of swimming both medley events. In the 200 m, his first event he swam a personal best in the semi finals with a 1:58.03, and then finished a touch slower the next night to finish seventh overall. In his final and best event, the 400 m individual medley Seto qualified first for the final and then surprised everyone when he won his first long course world champion title by finishing first in a time of 4:08.69, about half a second ahead of second place finisher Chase Kalisz. He is the second fastest Asian performer in the event, behind Hagino.