Ashwood reclaims distance crown in Adelaide

 

 

Swimming Australia, November 9, 2014:The last heats session of the 2014 Australian Short Course Championships at the SA Aquatic & Leisure Centre in Adelaide concluded with a 60-lap battle for the women’s 1500m freestyle title.

Olympian Jessica Ashwood was too strong for the rest of the field, picking up the gold medal in a time of 15:55.49, to reclaim her title in the event that she last won in 2010.

The silver medal went to Sydney Olympic Park’s Hayley Anschau, almost ten seconds behind Ashwood in 16:06.23 with Open Water swimmer Kareena Lee picking up the bronze medal in 16:15.80.

With three gold medals to her name from the meet so far, Emma McKeon will be on the hunt for a potential five Australian Short Course crowns when she lines up for the women’s 200m freestyle and the women’s 100m butterfly finals tonight.

The four-time Commonwealth Games gold medallist posted the fastest time for both events with a 1:54.69 in the 200m free heats this morning and a 56.56 from the 100m butterfly semi-finals last night.

McKeon will be joined in both finals by Brittany Elmslie who clocked a 1:56.04 to qualify in second spot for the 200 freestyle tonight with Indooroopilly swimmer Kylie Palmer rounding out the top three in 1:56.20.

Three-time champion and Australian All-Comers record holder Ashley Delaney (Nunawading, VIC) has set up a mouth-watering dual with recently crowned Australian record-holder Mitch Larkin (St. Peters Western, QLD) who is chasing his first National Sort Course win over 200m backstroke tonight.

Larkin is very much swimming’s man-of-the-moment, having already won the 50 and 100m crowns, setting a new Commonwealth record in the 100m.

It’s a case of Beijing Olympian Delaney v the London Olympian, Larkin, who will be chasing a treble owned by the great Matt Welsh in the 2000s and also won by Bobby Hurley in 2008.

Delaney was the fastest qualifier from today’s heats, winning his heat in 1:53.63 while Larkin won the final heat in 1:54.23 with Jack Gerrard (Melbourne Vicentre, VIC) the third fastest in 1:55.67.

Two other former Australian champions, 2011 winner Ben Edmonds (Marion, SA) 1:56.18 and defending title holder, London Olympian Matson Lawson (Tigersharks, VIC)1:56.39 and will also make up an all-star final.

Cairns Paralympian Grant “Scooter” Patterson won his third gold medal this morning in the 150m individual medley Multi Class timed final in a head-to-head race with fellow Paralympian Ahmed Kelly (Melbourne Vicentre). Patterson picked up 1550 points for his 3:07.77 with Kelly scoring 652 for his 2:58.33.

In other events…

Women’s 50m Backstroke Multi Class

The women’s 50m backstroke Multi Class kicked off proceedings on the last day of the 2014 Australian Short Course Championships with Paralympian Maddison Elliott taking top spot through to the final in a time of 38.14. Teneale Houghton from Liverpool in New South Wales will go through ranked second in 33.39 with Ashleigh Cockburn rounding out the top three with a time of 35.02.

Women’s 200m Breaststroke

Local swimmer Sally Hunter from Marion will have the home crowd behind her when she steps up to defend her title in the women’s 200m breaststroke final tonight.  Hunter posted the fastest time following the heats with a 2:25.24 to get the better of St Peters Western swimmer Georgia Bohl in 2:26.49 and Aisling Scott in 2:26.50.

Women’s 100m Butterfly Multi Class

West Australian Madeleine Scott (1:12.08) will take the top ranking into the women’s 100m butterfly Multi Class final tonight with Amy Cook ranked second in 1:15.84 and Nicole Miro third in 1:16.29.

Men’s 200m Butterfly
Sydney University’s emerging butterflyer Keiran Qaium has grabbed lane four in tonight’s 200m butterfly final after winning his heat in 1:56.25 to edge out Commonwealth Games and Pan Pac 200m freestyle gold medallist Thomas Fraser-Holmes (Miami, QLD) 1:56.63 with 100m butterfly winner David Morgan (TSS, QLD) clocking the third-fastest time of the morning, 1:57.20.

Commonwealth Games silver medallist and 2012 champion Grant Irvine is the sixth fastest qualifier in 1:57.85.

Multi-Class 100m butterfly
Mitchell Kilduff will hoping to turn his silvers into gold for Menai tonight in tonight’s 100m butterfly final after a stunning swim in this morning heats of 58.08, earning him 1122 points ahead of 50m butterfly winner Tim Antalfy (56.04 – 1054pts) and 200Im winner Joshua Alford (1:02.48 - 902pts).

Multi-Class 50m backstroke
Menai training partners Sean Russo and Mitchell Kilduff will go head-to-head in the men’s 50m backstroke final after they shared the spoils from this  morning’s heats – both clocking times that equated to 956 points – Russo 27.71 and Kilduff 30.55. Cairns Grant Patterson, who has already chalked up two wins at this meet is the third fastest (59.57 – 907pts) and Nunawading’s Jeremy Tidy is third (28.98 – 837pts)

Issued on behalf of Swimming Australia by
Ian Hanson| Media Manager 2014 Australian Swim Team, World Short Course Championships, Doha

Deputy Media Manager 2016 Australian Olympic Team, Rio
Media Manager, Surf Sports, SLSA
Media Manager Triathlon Australia
Media Manager 2014 Pan Pacific Swimming Championships
Media Manager, 2014 Australian Commonwealth Games Team