Swim podiums for SA in Barcelona

Thursday, 10 June 2010 10:30

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Swim podiums for SA in Barcelona

Day 1 of the Mare Nostrum Series in Barcelona and Chad Le Clos, Roland Schoeman and Wendy Trott were all on the podium.

Trott set the scene in the first race of the evening, the 800m freestyle final. Trott was lying in 5th after the first 100m which were covered in 1:02.06. Olympic Champion, Rebecca Adlington, 2009 World and European Champion Lotte Friis, Blair Evans and Erika Vallaeicija Garcia were all ahead of the South African. But then the talented Trott started to find her rhythm and clawed her way back.

After 250m Trott had inched passed Garcia and was a mere 8/100th of sec behind 4th placed Evans. At the half way point Trott was in control of the Bronze Medal position, whilst Friis and Adlington were having a furious battle for the Gold Medal position.

Once Trott had taken 3rd place after halfway, she gradually moved away from Evans and Garcia; and with 200m left her advantage was 3 seconds over Evans and 4 seconds over Garcia. By the time Trott had touched the wall in 8.29.97 she was just under 5 and 7 seconds ahead of Evans and Garcia. Adlington won the race for Gold with a new Championship record time of 8.23.25 to Friis’ 8.23.97.

Schoeman was next in the pool for his favourite event, the 50m Butterfly. Australia took the first two placings, Geoff Heugill touching first 23.91sec after the start with Andrew Lauterstein second in 24.08sec. The battle for Bronze though could not be any tighter. Both Schoeman and Russia’s Nikolay Skvortsov were timed at 24.13seconds, but Schoeman was given the nod over the Russian.

After making his mark in 2009 at the very same meeting in the 400m IM with a silver medal, Chad Le Clos has just seemed to have gotten better and better. Multiple medals at the Telkom SA Level 3 National Swimming Championships in March saw Le Clos book his spot for the first ever Youth Olympic Games. Then in April he qualified for the Commonwealth Games in the 200m Butterfly at the Telkom SA National Aquatic Championships. At the age of 18 it is clear that Le Clos is very much a star for 2012 and beyond. Le Clos thanked the selectors for their faith in him with a Bronze Medal in the 200m Butterfly touching the wall in 1:59.80. Gold going to Polands Pawel Korzianowski (1:57.44) and silver to Russia’s Nikolay Skvortsov (1:58.61).

Tomorrow sees the final day of the Mare Nostrum Series in Barcelona before the team moves to Canet for the final leg on the 12 and 13th June.

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