Aquatics: No medals but coach still happy

By SIMON LOUISSON

New Zealand coach Jan Cameron has been cheered by the performances of her team on the first two days of competition, despite a lack of medals.

Each of the six swimmers in morning action yesterday progressed to semifinals, and Hannah McLean, in the 100m backstroke, and veteran Jonathan Winter, in the 50m butterfly, made it through to finals.

Action was again dominated by Australian Ian Thorpe, who picked up the third of his expected seven golds.

New Zealand vicariously shared glory when Christchurch-based Zoe Baker won a gold in the 50m breaststroke for England.

However, the world record-holder, who has lived in New Zealand for the past six years, said she was not considering switching allegiance.

In her Games debut, McLean finished second in her heat to the fastest qualifier, England's Sarah Price, setting a national record of 1m 2.27s.

Winter, 30, equalled his national record set in 1997 with a time of 24.44s.

"I'm bloody rapt. It's good for an old man to do that," he said.

Winter, who came back from a two-year retirement 10 months ago, said it was a matter of whether the advantage of experience would outweigh the disadvantage of an ageing body.

Moss Burmester (16th) and Nicholas Sheeran (13th) swam in the same heat as Winter, but failed to quality for the finals.

Burmester, who starred on the first day's competition with a fourth in the 200m butterfly, said he had a shocker. He was clocked at 25.50s after swimming a personal best of 25.24s in his morning heat.

Sheeran, who equalled his morning time of 25.02s, which was just below his best of 24.87s, said he was now pinning his hopes on the 100m butterfly.

The 33-year-old Toni Jeffs failed to get past the semifinals of the 100m freestyle, finishing 16th, but she was unfazed because it was simply a warm-up event for her before the 50m event.

Melissa Jan Ingram, 17, set a personal best in qualifying in the 100m backstroke, and with her improved semifinals time of 1m 3.22s, she had knocked one second off it and set a national New Zealand age-group record.

She finished in 10th spot and missed the final.

Cameron said all the Kiwi swimmers had done exceptionally well to progress through the heats in their chosen strokes.

She and fellow coach Clive Rushton have been playing down expectations of medals, saying the team were building for the Athens Olympics in 2004.

Cameron said Dean Kent, Ingram, McLean, Burmester and Sheeran would make the nucleus of a strong team for the future.

Kent's throat infection had not completely cleared up, but he is expected him to swim in the 400m individual medley tomorrow.

- NZPA

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