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World Swimming Championships: Adam Peaty wins breaststroke gold
World Swimming Championships |
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| Venue: Kazan, Russia Dates: 2-9 August |
| Coverage: Live on BBC Two, Red Button, Radio 5 live sports extra, online, tablets, mobiles and BBC Sport app. |
Great Britain’s Adam Peaty has won gold in the men’s 100m breaststroke at the World Swimming Championships.
The 20-year-old from Uttoxeter produced a superb finish to beat Olympic champion Cameron van der Burgh at the touch in Kazan, Russia.
Peaty clocked 58.52 seconds, Van der Burgh timed 58.59 and Briton Ross Murdoch took the bronze in 59.09.
Elsewhere, Siobhan-Marie O’Connor took bronze to win Britain’s first world 200m individual medley medal.
The 19-year-old from Bath, who won 100m freestyle and 200m individual medley golds at the 2014 Commonwealth Games, clocked two minutes 8.77 seconds to finish behind gold-medal winner Katinka Hosszu and Kanako Watanabe of Japan.
Hosszu, of Hungary, set a new world record of 2:06.12 seconds, taking 0.03 seconds off Ariana Kukors’ previous record from the 2009 World Championships.
British Olympic gold medallist Rebecca Adlington: |
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| “Cameron van der Burgh knew he had to go out hard and try to hold on but he just could not given that Peaty has got the back end to a race that he has and now I’m really excited for Adam’s 200m breaststroke later in the week.” |
Last year Peaty captured the European and Commonwealth titles and he set a new world record in London in April – but he had to show tenacity and his trademark strong finish to win in Kazan.
Van der Burgh was under world record pace at the turn but Peaty surged through in the final few metres to touch first and again deny the South African, who lost out to Australia’s Christian Sprenger two years ago.
“I wasn’t going for my world record, I was just going for gold,” said Peaty, who set a championship record of 58.18 on Sunday to qualify for the final. “I knew I had some catching up to do but I kept fighting right to the end and it paid off.”
He is the first British world champion in the 100m breaststroke since David Wilkie won both the 100m and 200m in 1975.
Peaty, who won four gold medals in the 2014 European Championships in Berlin, is also world record holder in the 50m breaststroke, which begins on Tuesday.
Swimming medal table after day two |
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| Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total | |
| France | 2 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Great Britain | 1 | 1 | 2 | 4 |
| Australia | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| Hungary | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| China | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| USA | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
Murdoch, whose favoured 200m breaststroke takes place on Thursday and Friday, raced in lane eight and clocked a Scottish record.
He told BBC Sport: “I can’t believe I got my hands on that world medal. I’m the fastest I’ve ever been. That gives me a lot of confidence going into next year for the front end of that 200.”
British qualifiers
James Guy won the first semi-final of the men’s 200m freestyle in 1:45.43 but Calum Jarvis was last in the second semi-final in 1:47.64 and did not qualify.
Liam Tancock finished second in the first 100m backstroke semi-final with a time of 53.19, with Chris Walker-Hebborn also through after a 53.39 which saw him finish sixth in the second semi-final.
Lauren Quigley qualified for the women’s 100m backstroke final after finishing third in 59.71, but Lizzie Simmonds was sixth in that first semi-final and her 1:00.40 was not enough to qualify.
World records
American 18-year-old Katie Ledecky clocked 15 minutes, 27.71 seconds in the 1500m freestyle heats, taking 0.65 seconds off the mark she set at last year’s Pan Pacific championships in Australia.
Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom’s time of 55.64 seconds in the women’s 100m butterfly broke her previous mark of 55.74 set in the semi-finals on Sunday.
BBC Sport