Rebecca Adlington enjoyed her early morning swim here today as she moved through to tomorrow’s 800m final as the second fastest qualifier.
The double Olympic champlon won her heat in 8:35.82, which was only bettered by the previous heat winner, South Africa’s Wendy Trott, who clocked 8:34.34.
“This morning I just wanted to swim through comfortably and prepare for the final tomorrow night,” Adlington said.
Meanwhile she was looking forward to tonight’s 4x200m freestyle relay. “I am so excited to be a part of the relay team. I love getting involved because such a team effort is a really good opportunity to represent your country.”
Sasha Matthews and Aimee Wilmott also went through as fourth and fifth fastest qualifiers respectively.
James Goddard was fastest qualifier for tonight’s 200m backstroke final, clocking 1:59.30, with Ryan Bennett fifth qualifier with 2.00.32 and Christopher Walker-Hebborn seventh in the listings with 2:00.57.
Ellen Gandy was the fifth fastest qualifier in the 100m butterfly, clocking 59.63, with Fran Halsall, already one gold medal to the good, eighth fastest in the heats with 1:00.26 and Jessica Sylvester a place behind her in 1:00.31.
“The 50 was a fun swim for he – I didn’t actually expect to do anything in that. I just came out this morning to have a bit of fun and relax.”
Grant Turner and Adam Brown qualified fourth and fifth respectively for this evening’s 100m freestyle semi-finals, clocking 49.87sec and 49.88, with South Africa’s Gideon Louw posting the fastest time, 49.24. Simon Burnett was tenth qualifier with 49.97.
In the men’s 50m freestyle S9, Simon Jay Miller won his heat in 27.00sec to go through to tonight’s final as second fastest qualifier behind Australia’s Matthew Cowdrey, who managed 25.66.
“I didn’t feel 100 per cent this morning but it just shows with a bit of mental toughness you can pull anything out. I’m looking for a medal, but more importantly a big pb. I’ve trained so hard for this, it’s been a long time coming.”
Stacey Tadd reached tonight’s 200m breaststroke final with 2:28.75, but Kate Hutchinson just missed out with a time of 2:34.08.
The men’s 4x200m freestyle men moved through to tonight’s final as second fastest behind Australia, clocking 7:22.61, with the Australians recording 7:22.47.