Irish swimmer Shane Ryan, 32, compared the inaugural edition of the Enhanced Games with the 2026 China Open Swimming Championships in a controversial manner. He had no hesitation in calling the China Open a “money grab,” while stating that at least the Enhanced Games organizers haven’t been shy about it.

“It's the same thing as when the US swimmers went over to China to that meet where there was a money grab. That's the same thing. Exact same thing... We're being open about it,” the American-born star said as per the post on X from Swim Updates.

Notably, the 2026 Enhanced Games, held on May 24 in Las Vegas, had incredible prize money for all of its events in swimming, track, and weightlifting. A winner of the swim race earned $250,000, while second and third place got $125,000 and $75,000, respectively.

The finisher in fourth and last place still bagged a $50,000 payday for themselves.

If you look at the prize money for the China Open held in March of this year in Shenzhen, the swimmers earned $10,000 for winning the gold medal, as per Global Times. At the same time, the silver and bronze medalists took home $6,000 and $4,000, respectively.

Moreover, during the Enhanced Games last weekend, Ryan took the pool in the men’s 50m backstroke and men’s 100m freestyle events after retiring from competitive swimming last year.

In the 50m backstroke, he finished in second place with a time of 25.23 behind Hunter Armstrong of the USA at 24.21, bagging $125,000. As far as the 100m freestyle goes, he took third place at 48.92 to earn himself a $75,000 payday after being beaten by Greek Kristian Gkolomeev (46.60) and Armstrong (48.09).

Kristian Gkolomeev Becomes Only Athlete to Set a World Record at Enhanced Games

During the 2026 Enhanced Games, Kristian Gkolomeev from Greece was the only athlete to register a world record in the men’s 50m freestyle event with a time of 20.81. With that, the 32-year-old took home the bonus prize money of $1 million set by the organizers for breaking a world record at the games in Las Vegas this year.

He beat the world record time of 20.88 set by Australian Cameron McEvoy in March of this year, but it won’t be officially counted in the record books.

This is because the Enhanced Games are considered illegal by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). They reason that competitors involved in it are taking prohibited substances and wearing banned full-body “super suits” made with 100% polyurethane.

In another major result from the games, Fred Kerley won the men’s 100m track race with a time of 9.97 seconds after boldly saying he would “destroy” Usain Bolt’s 9:58 world record.

Do you think the 2026 Enhanced Games were a success? Please tell us in the comments.

Read more at Swimmer's Club!

Written by

Arjun Sharma

Edited by

Ankita Yadav