Kent leads Kiwi swimmers in final day at Panpacs
Veteran Dean Kent leads the New Zealand swimmers in the last night of finals at the Pan Pacific championships in Canada today.
The 27 year old qualified for the A final in his favoured 200m individual medley with five other New Zealand swimmers to contest B finals at Victoria. Helen Norfolk qualified in the 200m individual medley, Annabelle Carey and Glenn Snyders in the 200m breaststroke and Hannah McLean and Liz Coster in the 50m freestyle.
The session was finished on a high note when Bryn Murphy set a massive personal best to win from the slower qualifiers in the 1500m. The Southlander who now swims for the Waves club in Dunedin swam a negative split on his way to recording 15:33.55, a remarkable 10 seconds under his previous best and within six seconds of the long standing national record of the great Danyon Loader. The fastest eight 1500m swimmers contest the timed final in the evening programme.
Kent, starting alongside world recordholder Michael Phelps (USA) in the heats this morning, clocked the eighth fastest time of 2:02.72. This was just over a second outside his best set in winning a silver medal at the Commonwealth Games.
Christchurch’s Carey (Aquagym) snuck under her previous best to record 2:38.24 in the 200m breaststroke to qualify for the b final while Snyders (North Shore) was close to his best in the men’s race to grab the 15th best time and a spot in the B final.
Backstrokers McLean and Coster earned some bragging rights when they edged out the Kiwi freestylers and snatch spots in the B final of the 50m freestyle. McLean went 26.26 and Coster 26.41, both personal bests for the one length sprint.
None of the men got through to the final after the Americans dominated the heats, led by Cullen Jones and the ebullient Gary Hall. Several recorded personal bests including Corney Swanepoel, Robert Voss, Moss Burmester, John Zulch and Ben Pickersgill-Brown.
Results, day 4 heats:
200m individual medley:
Women: Helen Norfolk 2:18.35, 17.
Men: Dean Kent 2:02.72, 8.
200m breaststroke:
Women: Annabelle Carey 2:38.24, 19.
Men: Glenn Snyders 2:18.97, 15.
50m freestyle:
Women: Hannah McLean 26.26, 14; Liz Coster 26.41, 16; Alison Fitch 26.77, 23; Lauren Boyle 26.96, 30.
Men: Corney Swanepoel 23.51, 29; Cameron Gibson 23.88, 38; Michael Jack 24.01, 41; Moss Burmester 24.06, 42; Ben Pickersgill-Brown 24.57, 49; John Zulch 25.08, 51.
1500m:
Bryn Murphy 15:33.55, 1.
