Lee Nam-eun is the country's first woman to reach the finals of the world swimming championships.

In the women's 50-meter backstroke Thursday, the 16-year-old earned a finals berth in Montreal, Canada, with a time of 28.95 seconds, a new South Korean record.

In the qualifying round, she had a time of 29.26 seconds, ranking 13th among 65 swimmers.

Her new record is one tenth of a second faster than the previous 29.05 seconds set by Shim Min-ji at the 2003 world championships.