golden guy seeks more after double
swimming, motorsport, hockey & rowing
There were two European Championships gold medals already in the bag for James guy as he bid for a third. The University of Bath-based swimmer stood atop the podium for both the men’s 4x200m freestyle relay – alongside Bath team-mate Callum Jarvis – and the 4x100m medley. He was unable to add the 200m freestyle prize as he finished fourth in the final in 1min 46.2secs on Tuesday night, but had already qualified for the 100m butterfly semi-finals, which took place after the Chronicle went to press yesterday. The medley relay win came in a new European record time of 3:40.18, alongside Georgia Davies, Adam Peaty and Freya Anderson. Guy himself swam a sensational 50.96 butterfly split to give Anderson a near five-second advantage for the decisive freestyle leg. In the freestyle relay triumph, Jarvis had kicked things off for Britain as he finished second in the first leg, Guy taking the team home in a championship record 7:05.32, more than a second clear of second-placed Russia. Guy, who pulled out of the 200m butterfly final to focus on the relay, said: “Doing both races would have been suicide, there would have been no time to rest between them. It was a great swim by the team, onwards and upwards.” Fellow National Centre Bath swimmer Cameron Kurle had earlier helped Britain qualify for the final with victory in their heat. He had also been part of the mixed 4x200m freestyle relay team in the heats on Saturday, earning Britain a place in the final where they won bronze. The opening night of competition at the Tollcross International Swimming Centre in Glasgow saw MJ Church ambassador Anna Hopkin, a recent sport & exercise science graduate from the University of Bath, and National Centre Bath swimmer Siobhan-marie O’connor narrowly miss out on a medal in the women’s 4x100m freestyle relay. They swam the first two legs for a British quartet that also included Eleanor Faulkner and Anderson, who wasn’t quite able to overhaul third-placed Denmark on a storming last leg. France narrowly took gold ahead of the Netherlands. O’connor, coached by David Mcnulty, also qualified for the women’s 100m breaststroke final on Sunday, where she finished fifth in 1:07.30. She won both her 200m individual medley heat and semi ahead of Wednesday night’s final. Hopkin came sixth in the 100m freestyle heats and eighth in the semi-finals. Chloe Tutton was runner-up in her 200m breaststroke heat in 2:26.62, but was disqualified from the final. The synchonised swimming competition saw Team Bath Synchro Club’s Ilaria Brandimarte, on her British debut, help GB finish ninth overall in the Team Free Routine final on Saturday. Their tribal-themed routine earned a score of 78.9333, an improvement on their total in the previous day’s qualifying heats. Russia, Ukraine and Italy took the podium places.