The New Zealand record holder Daniel Bell has failed to reach the 100m backstroke semi finals, at the world swimming champs in Shanghai.
But the Wellington swimmer Gareth Kean is through to the top 16 recording a personal best time in the event.
The 19 year old kean clocked 53.89 seconds, the sixth equal fastest time, to advance to tonight's semi finals.
Kean recorded the same time as Australian Ben Treffers, the son of Mark Treffers who won a gold for New Zealand in the individual medley at 1974 Commonwealth Games in Christchurch.
Bell was almost a second behind Kean finishing 23rd.
The experienced Melissa Ingram, preparing for her main event the 200m backstroke, narrowly missed a place in the semi finals of the 100m backstroke by 9/100ths of a second.
She clocked 1.01.48, half a second outside her best this year, to record the 17th fastest time and miss out on the top 16 by just one spot.
