Swim success for uni stars
Stirling University swimmer Kathleen Dawson wrote her name into the record books on Saturday at the Manchester Aquatics Centre with a stunning swim to win the women’s 100m backstroke at the British Swimming Invitational Meet.
Twenty-four hours earlier she had landed a personal best and Scottish record in winning the 50m event and added another pb in her 100m heat.
And in the final, she touched home in 58.65 - the fastest ever swim by a British athlete outside of the suited era - and just ahead of her Stirling University team-mate Cassie Wild who also registered a pb in 58.56. Wild was third in the 50m event.
Dawson said afterwards: “I’m over the moon with that! I mean I don’t want to toot my own horn, but I kind of expected to go a 58 because I’ve been swimming so well at these time trials we’ve been doing in Stirling, so it was expected, but I’m still buzzing with it.”
The duo delivered another brilliant 1-2 finish for Stirling University in the 200m backstroke final, the race unfolding in a similar way to the 100m event with Dawson setting the pace throughout and Wild never far away. Dawson clocked 2:09.44 for the first time in five years, whilst Wild came home in 2.10.93.
World champion Duncan Scott won three finals - 200m Individual Medley, 100m and 200m freestyle.
On Saturday in the medley he overhauled the Litchfield brothers Joe and Matt in the lanes outside him while in a fast and furious 100m contest, he drew on all his reserves to get the touch ahead of Tom Dean with just two hundredths of a second separating the pair.
Afterwards he said: “I train to do doubles like that and it was good I was able to execute the races the way that I wanted to. They were hard races and there are some boys in there who are really quick.
“It’s a year since I raced the Edinburgh International so it was good to get back out there with some long course racing and I really enjoyed it, especially the 100 free.”
In his 200m freestyle final, he fought back to get the better of James Guy and Tom Dean.
“The 200 free in Britain is always good fun,” he said after the race. “I’ve been doing some race simulations at home, but to come here and race some other guys has been really good.
“It was just so tight and that’s what’s so good about it – head to head racing gets a bit more out of you.”
In other races, Nicholas Pyle won the 50m backstroke, Ross Murdoch showed good form to finish second in the 200m breaststroke behind James Wilby and third behind Adam Peaty and Wilby in the 100m and Keanna MacInnes was second in the 100m butterfly in 59.33.