Ye Shiwen (L) and Sun Yang

China's newly-crowned world champions and up-and-coming Sun Yang and Ye Shiwen were named Pacific rim swimmers of the year 2011 by US sports magazine Swimming World on Wednesday.

Sun, twice-winner at the FINA World Championships 2011 Shanghai and the new 1,500m world record holder, was elected by a unanimous vote of 19. Other male nominees include Olympic and world 400m freestyle champion Pak T'ae-hwan from South Korea and Japanese "breaststroke king" Kousuke Kitajima.

Sun's senior fellow Zhang Lin got the laureate in 2009 for his 800m triumph in Rome that year. It was China's first world title won by a male swimmer.

In the women's category, 15-year-old Ye trounced her world champion fellows Jiao Liuyang, Zhao Jing and Olympic champion Liu Zige for 13 votes out of 19. Ye won the 200m individual medley in Shanghai to become the youngest world champion since 1978.

The last China's female swimmer to be awarded the honor was Le Jingyi in 1996 for her Atlanta Olympics gold.