Perkins and Temple medal as Walsh reigns at worlds

[Pelican Press 0]

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

Perkins and Temple medal as Walsh reigns at worlds

Alex Perkins and Matt Temple have grabbed bronze medals for Australia on a record-shattering day again dominated by US sensation Gretchen Walsh at the world short course swimming championships in Budapest.

Perkins took bronze in the women’s 100m butterfly final on Saturday, while Temple also finished third in the equivalent men’s event.

But even the freakishly brilliant ********* teen Summer McIntosh, who obliterated the 400m individual medley mark for her second global mark of the championships, had to swim in the shadow of the 21-year-old Walsh, who took her tally of world individual records over the week to an unthinkable eight.

In the greatest week’s work ever witnessed at a short course event, the Nashville swimmer smashed two more individual global marks on Saturday as she lifted her fifth gold of the week in the 100m fly.

While she powered to victory in 52.71sec to take 0.16sec off the mark she’d set the night before, Queenslander Perkins battled on courageously in what felt almost like another race to clock 55.10sec, and finish third behind Dutchwoman Tessa Giele (54.66).

Not satisfied, Walsh returned 50 minutes later to the Duna Arena 25-metre pool and blitzed her way to a new global mark in the semi-finals of the 50m freestyle, clocking 22.87sec to take 0.06sec off the record set by Dutchwoman Ranomi Kromowidjojo seven years ago.

“I was definitely a little bit shocked (by the 100m fly record), it was quite a short turnaround, but everything’s going my way,” shrugged the American, who has broken nine world records over the week, including one in a relay, and could well smash a 10th in Sunday’s final of the freestyle dash.

“It’s been harder and harder to get through these races, just because it’s been a really long meet. To break the butterfly record, it’s something amazing, it’s crazy, and yeah, I’m really happy with it.”

Kromowidjojo was on hand to present Walsh with her eighth world-record bonus cheque of $US25,000 ($A39,000) for the week, giving her an individual total of $US200,000 ($A312,000) in all.

Minutes after Perkins had grabbed her bronze, 25-year-old Victorian Temple also played his part in a record-breaking affair as he came home third in 48.71sec behind Frenchman Maxime Grousset (48.57) and Swiss Noe Ponti, who broke Caeleb Dressel’s 100m fly record in 47.71sec.

The 18-year-old McIntosh was in a class of her own in the 400 medley relay, clocking the 24th world record of the meeting — an all-time record for the championships — as she clocked 4:15.48 to slice three-and-a-half seconds off the seven-year-old record of Spaniard Mireia Belmonte (4:18.94).

In the men’s 50m free, Jordan Crooks, from the Cayman Islands, became the first man ever to break the 20-seconds mark in his semi-final, clocking 19.90sec to eclipse the mark of 20.08sec he had set in the heats earlier in the day.

The mixed 4x100m medley relay team of Iona Anderson, Josh Yong, Temple and Milla Jansen just missed out on Australia’s 12th medal of the championships, as they finished fourth in 3:32.83 behind a victorious Russian quartet competing under a ‘neutral team’ flag.

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

#Perkins #Temple #medal #Walsh #reigns #worlds

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up