LEISEL GETS CHERRY FOR HER CAKE
BEIJING, CHINA, August 12: Leisel Jones finally broke her Olympic drought today as the breaststroke queen converted years of dominance into her first individual gold medal at the Water Cube.
And unlike Athens four years ago, Jones shed tears of joy as she paraded the stadium with a gold medal draped around her neck.
Jones simply annihilated her rivals by over one and a half seconds to claim the 100m title in a time of one minute 05.17 seconds and erase the painful memories from her Greek tragedy four years ago. TODD BALYM AAP REPORTS...
She wasn't Australia's only medallist on day three as unknown South Australian Hayden Stoeckel continued his shock emergence with a bronze medal in the 100m backstroke final.
But nobody could steal the limelight from Jones today as she finally gained redemption for the drama of Athens when she finished third in the 100m as a favourite and claimed she just wasn't ready to win.
She has been undefeated since she crumbled under the pressure at the 2004 Games and finally saluted on the biggest stage with the second fastest time in history in one of the most emphatic wins in Olympic breaststroke competition.
"I gave it everything I could and I couldn't care less about the time ... an Olympic gold is an Olympic gold," she said.
"A little bit of shock and relief really. It has been a long journey, it has been eight long years and I think just a lot of relief the training was definitely worth it."
While her sour-faced response to bronze in the same event four years ago still haunts her, Jones was rather restrained in her Olympic celebrations in the pool as she managed a smile and hug with bronze medallist Mirna Jukic (1:07.34) of Austria.
But her true feelings emerged after finally getting her hands on the medal as tears flowed when she shared a hug with both her mum and fiancee Marty Pask during her lap of honour.
"I just really soaked up the atmosphere," said Jones.
"I just relaxed and took it all in.
"I knew the swimming part was only a very small part of my life and just to enjoy it."
Teammate Tarnee White (1:07.63) had a disappointing swim to finish in sixth as American Rebecca Soni (1:06.73) grabbed the silver medal.
Jones was the only swimmer in the world who could crash the American party at the pool today as Michael Phelps (200m freestyle) and Aaron Piersol (100m backstroke) both broke their own world records and Natalie Coughlin (100m backstroke) claimed the other gold medals on offer.
Australian Stoeckel tied third with Arkady Vyatchanin of Russia in the 100m backstroke with a time of 53.18, behind American duo Piersol (52.54) and Matt Grevers (53.11).
Australian teammate Ashley Delaney (53.31) also produced an outstanding swim to finish fifth.
"It is just amazing really," said Stoeckel.
"I came here to the Olympics not thinking I would get a medal or anything and I just wanted to make the final."
Phelps smashed his 200m freestyle (1:42.96) world record in winning his third gold medal of the Games while Coughlin (58.96) claimed back-to-back Olympic 100m backstroke titles.
Australian medley star Stephanie Rice cruised into the 200m final in second place with a 2:10.58 semi-final swim and will be joined in the decider by teammate Alicia Coutts (2:12.03) who was fifth fastest.
Australian Bronte Barratt qualified for her second final of the Games, this time grabbing fifth place in the 200m freestyle after a 1:57.55 semi-final swim.
Linda Mackenzie missed the final after clocking 1:58.19 to be 12th.
FINALS RESULTS
After day four...
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400m individual medley 1 Michael Phelps USA 4:03.84WR 2 Laszlo Cseh HUN 4:06.16 3 Ryan lochte USA 4:08.09 4 Alessio Boggiatto ITA 4:12.16 5 Luca Marin ITA 4:12.47 6 Gergo Kis HUN 4:12.84 7 Brian Johns CAN 4:13.38 8 Thiago Pereira BRA 4:15.40
400m freestyle 1. Taehwan Park KOR 3:41.86 2. Lin Zhang CHN 3:42.44 3. Larsen Jensen USA 3:42.78 4. Peter Vanderkaay USA 3:43.11 5. Oussama Mellouli TUN 3:43.45 6. Grant Hackett AUS 3:43.84 7. Yuriy Prilukov RUS 3:43.97 8. Nikita Lobintsev RUS 3:48.29
100m breaststsroke 1 Kosuke Kitajima JPN 58.91 2 Dale Oen Alexander NOR 59.20 3 Hugues Duboscq FRA 59.37 4 Brendan Hansen USA 59.57 5 Brenton Rickard AUS 59.74 6 Roman Sludnov RUS 59.87 7 Igor Borysik UKR 1:00.20 8 Mark Gangloff USA 1:00.24
4x100m freestyle relay 1 USA 3:08.24 2 FRA 3:08.32 3 AUS 3:09.91 4 ITA 3:11.48 5 SWE 3:11.92 6 CAN 3:12.26 7 RSA 3:12.66 8 GBR 3:12.87
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4x100m freestyle relay 1 NED 3:33.76 2 USA 3:34.33 3 AUS 3:35.05 4 CHN 3:35.64 5 GER 3:36.85 6 FRA 3:37.68 7 GBR 3:38.18 8 CAN 3:38.32
400m individual medley 1 Stephanie Rice AUS 4:29.45 WR 2 Kirsty Coventry ZIM 4:29.89 3 Katie Hoff USA 4:31.71 4 Elizabeth Beisel USA 4:34.24 5 Alessia Filippi ITA 4:34.34 6 Hannah Miley GBR 4:39.44 7 Yana Martynova RUS 4:40.04 8 Xuanxu Li CHN 4:42.13
100m butterfly 1 Lisbeth Trickett AUS 56.73 2 Christine Magnuson USA 57.10
3 Jessicah Schipper AUS 57.25 5 Li Tao SIN 57.99 6 Jemma Lowe GBR 58.06 7Gabriella Silva BRA 58.10 8 Inge Dekker NED 58.54
400m freestyle 1 Rebecca Adlington GBR 4:03.22 2 Katie Hoff USA 4:03.29 3 Joanne Jackson GBR 4:03.52 4 Coralie Balmy FRA 4:03.60 5 Federica Pellegrini ITA 4:04.56 6 Camelia Alina Potec ROU 4:04.66 7 Bronte Barratt AUS 4:05.05 8 Laure Manaudou FRA 4:11.26 |
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MEDAL COUNT - AUSTRALIA Gold (3) •· Stephanie Rice 400m individual medley 4:29.45 WR •· Lisbeth Trickett 100m butterfly 56.73 •· Leisel Jones 100m breaststroke 1:05.17
Silver -
Bronze (4) •· 4x100m women freestyle relay Final Cate Campbell 54.43, Alice Mills 54.43, Melanie Schlanger 53.85, Lisbeth Trickett 52.34, 3:35.05 (Heat: Cate Campbell 54.65 Alice Mills 54.55 Melanie Schlanger 54.69 Shayne Reese 53.92 3:37.81) •· 4x100m men freestyle relay H Andrew Lauterstein 48.68 Leith Brodie 48.42 Patrick Murphy 48.09 Matt Targett 47.22 3:12.41 F Eamon Sullivan 47.24 WR Andrew Lauterstein 47.87 Ashley Callus 47.55 Matt Targett 47.25 3:09.91 •· Jessicah Schipper 100m butterfly 57.25 •· Hayden Stoeckel 100m backstroke 53.18
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