Silver medals no comfort for SA swimmers pipped at the post
CHAD le Clos and Cameron van der Burgh lost their world championship titles just 20 minutes apart in Kazan, Russia, last night.
Van der Burgh’s defeat was hardly a shock as he again played second fiddle to young gun and world record-holder Adam Peaty of England in the 50m breaststroke.
But Le Clos needs to ask some honest questions after failing to overhaul 29-year-old veteran Hungarian Laszlo Cseh in the final lap of the 200m butterfly, the South African’s trademark event. That was the race in which Le Clos made his name, when he stunned Michael Phelps and the planet at the 2012 London Olympics.
He followed that with the 200m and 100m butterfly double at the last world championships in 2013.
The way he has spoken in the past few years, he clearly wants to be invincible; the “fuhrer of ’fly”.
But last night he was exposed by a swimmer who had last won a world title a decade ago, when Le Clos was just 13. Now 23, the Durban star looked like he was missing some huff-and-puff, particularly over the third lap.
He went out hard and held the lead for two laps, and then Cseh overtook him in the third 50m and ground out a commanding lead.
Le Clos made up ground over the final quarter, trying hard to catch him at the death, but he left his final charge too late and missed out by two-tenths of a second.
Cseh, who clocked one minute, 53.48 seconds, said he had changed coach and training methods for the final fling of his career.
“The last 20m were really tough, didn’t feel my arms, but I told myself this one I wouldn’t let go. I almost cried afterwards but managed to hold it back. I’m strong, you know.”
Le Clos, who will attempt to defend his 100m fly crown on Saturday, can take heart that his 1:53.68 was his fastest time since the 1:52.96 he recorded in 2012, although it’s still far off the 1:51.51 world record he has eyed.
Le Clos headed to Kazan complaining his preparation had been hampered by injury and illness, similar to the problems he faced before the 2014 Commonwealth Games when he cut his planned competition schedule from nine events to seven.
Van der Burgh touched in an impressive 26.66 but it was not enough to beat Peaty (26.51) in the 50m breaststroke.
The silver means Van der Burgh boasts consecutive 50m medals from the last five world champs dating back to 2007, second only to Phelps, who won six straight 100m butterfly medals. “It’s just nice to be consistent and always up with the best in the world,” said Van der Burgh, who also took silver in the 100m breaststroke behind Peaty earlier in the week.
Van der Burgh said his main goal was the Olympics next year.
“Tonight wasn’t SA’s night with Chad getting silver and me getting silver, so we’ll take silver this year and we’ll kick on next year. So it’s a lot of motivation, yeah,” said Van der Burgh, who produced his best 100m time in three years in Kazan, as well as his fastest-ever 50m time. He and Ayrton Sweeney compete in the same 200m breaststroke heat this morning.