From small town Coromandel to the Commonwealth Games
Andrew Jeffcoat’s sudden emergence in Birmingham has taken him all the way to the top step of the podium.
The unheralded swimmer completed a startling rise by winning the 50m backstroke final at Sandwell Aquatics Centre, claiming New Zealand’s fifth gold medal in the pool at these Games.
Jeffcoat started out strong and led the whole way to break the New Zealand record for the second time in Birmingham in a winning time of 24.65 seconds. South Africa’s Pieter Coetze, who won gold in the 100m backstroke earlier these Games, was second with Javier Acevedo of Canada taking bronze.
“I’m pretty happy to be here. It’s awesome to be able to get up after the 100 the other day — I was pretty disappointed to only get fourth. So to be here and be able to step up, I’m very proud of myself,” Jeffcoat said.
“It’s something you dream of. You wake up every day for moments like that. There’s not a lot that I can say, really — you can’t really put it into words. It’s a special feeling. Probably the best feeling I’ve ever had. I’m just beyond grateful.”
Jeffcoat is a relative stranger at this level, having competed at his first longcourse world championships in June.
The 23-year-old finished 13th in the 50m backstroke in Hungary but, with the best backstroke exponents belonging to the United States and continental Europe, he was always primed to break through at his debut Commonwealth Games.
That breakthrough first came in the 100m backstroke, where Jeffcoat was unfortunate to finish fourth, missing the podium by only 0.07s.
And it continued in the earlier stages of the 50m discipline, qualifying as the second-fastest swimmer while winning his heat with a time of 25.04s.
Jeffcoat went even quicker in Monday’s semifinals, stopping the clock in a new personal-best and national-record time of 24.82s, winning the race ahead of Australia’s Bradley Woodward.
That mark was again the second fastest of all competitors, trailing as he did in the heats only South Africa’s Pieter Coetze, this time by onehundredth of a second.
Jeffcoat, from the small Coromandel town of Colville, will have little time to celebrate this result, set to complete what has turned into a stunning Games with the 200m backstroke, which was to start overnight.