Michael Phelps put the disappointment of losing his 200m Freestyle crown behind him, bouncing back to win the men's 200m Butterfly in a world record of 1 minute 51.51 seconds on day four of the World Swimming Championships, writes RTÉ Sport's John Kenny in Rome.
Phelps didn’t follow through with his coach’s threat of pulling out of the meet due to the controversy surrounding the contentious 100% polyurethane outfits, taking the gold medal over half a second under his own world record.
Indeed, the world record count now stands at a staggering 21.
American Mary Descenza, swimming in the heats of the 200m Fly, took the first one on Wednesday registering 2 minutes 4.14 second in the fourth heat of six.
In the evening finals, new records went to Aleksandra Gerasimenya of Belarus in the women’s 50m Backstroke (27.38 secs), Frederica Pellegrini of Italy who did the 200-400m freestyle double, winning the 200m in 1 min 52.98 secs, while Cameron Van Der Burgh of South Africa won the men's 50m Breaststroke in 26.67 secs.
Zhang Lin of China destroyed the men's 800m Freestyle world record in the final race of the night in 7 mins 32.12 seconds, over six seconds better than Grant Hackett’s four-year-old record time.
The new generation body suits may be aiding the elite to break world records and they are also helping Irish swimmers reach new heights as Barry Murphy and Ryan Harrison both went under 50 seconds for the men's 100m Freestyle in the heats this morning.
The magic barrier was breached by Murphy in the relay last Sunday and he did it again in the heats of the individual 100m Free, the last 10 metres really hurting as he posted a time of 49.76 seconds, under the record time he set four days ago.
However, that record only stood for a few minutes as Ryan Harrison, Murphy's team-mate at Tennessee, won the following heat in 49.49 seconds, bringing home the last 50m like the distance swimmer he is.
The times in an Irish context are great, they show real progression, but the 100m Free is the blue riband, the one everyone wants to win, so Murphy and Harrison are some way back from Frenchman Alan Bernard who is favourite and is likely to break 47 seconds for the event in Thursday's final.
Aishling Cooney raced in the women's 50m Breaststroke, but didn’t progress as Grainne Murphy set a new Irish junior record in the women's 200m Butterfly as the meet continues on a positive note for the 16-year-old
On Thursday, there are four individual and one Irish relay squad in action, amongst those, Andrew Bree who goes in the heats of the men's 200m Breaststroke at Foro Italico.
Bree was placed 10th overall in the event in the Beijing Olympics and he will hope to go one further by making the final here in the Italian capital with his fist mission to get out of the heats and onto the semi-finals.
Other Irish swimmers in action are Fiona Doyle and Clare Dawson in the women’s 100m Freestyle, Karl Burdis in the 200m Backstroke, and the women’s 4x200m Freestyle team relay squad.
