The first day of another unexpected World Swimming Championships from Doha, Qatar, saw the Dolphins collect all two silver medals – despite falling one short away from gold – as they sit 5th on this medal tally. Oh so close from Elijah Winnington who came back so hard to hunt the leader down in the last 100m towards the end on what has been a huge 400m Freestyle Final, but just didn’t tap the wall first under pressure to upsurge Woomin Kim (South Korea) in 2nd. Good to see him rebound though as hope he will go one better again like he did two years ago with his first gold medal, having only collected one bronze during the 4 x Men’s 200m Freestyle Relay at the last World Champs in Fukuoka, Japan, seven months ago.
Now some of our top swimmers have chosen to forego this tourney, especially with a big year ahead that early with the Olympics later this July-August. However, the female relay team did their absolute best in the 4 x 100m Freestyle Final consisting of Shayna Jack, Abbey Harkin, Alex Perkins & Brianna Throssell. Again, brilliant start by Throssell up to 2nd place while things could’ve been better when it comes to the last half dashes during the middle leg in particular with Harkin & Perkins in there, but Shayna Jack got them back up front in the best way possible where she fell so short by just 00.32 sec towards the end there to the Netherlands. Sure the second string squad will learn well from the best who are not in Doha by filling their void and push themselves towards the next level throughout this week and the months to come.
And shoutout to our Tasman neighbour Erika Fairweather who won her first ever gold medal for both herself and New Zealand after she dominated comfortably in the 400m Freestyle Final. Let’s hope despite some of them missing or sitting out, the Dolphins can do better on Day 2 tomorrow morning (Australian time) by topping the medal charts once again.