KEY POINTS:
New Zealand have qualified a third relay team for the Beijing Olympics after a controversial final session of heats at the world swimming championships in Melbourne yesterday.
The men's medley quartet of Cameron Gibson, Glenn Snyders, Corney Swanepoel and Mark Herring were the 11th fastest in the heats, narrowly missing out on a place in the final. But they were safely through as one of the top 12 for an automatic qualification for the 2008 Games in Beijing.
One team who still need to qualify are the top seeded United States, who were disqualified after butterfly exponent Ian Crocker was adjudged to have left the blocks too soon at the start of the third leg.
Earlier, the women's 4x200m freestyle and 4x100m freestyle teams booked berths for Beijing.
Of the other New Zealanders in action yesterday, Helen Norfolk and Dean Kent narrowly missed qualification in the heats of the 400m individual medley.
That leaves Zoe Baker, a two-time medallist at the world championships, as the sole New Zealander in action last night after she won through to the final of the 50m breaststroke in the semifinals.
Kent produced a strong performance to finish third in his heat behind the two fastest qualifiers, led by Phelps, with six gold medals to his credit already at these championships, and Italy's Luca Martin.
Norfolk, who has been concentrating on freestyle over the past six months, surprised to be ninth fastest in the 400m medley. She was third in her heat behind Australian Stephanie Rice and China's Rui Yu in 4min 44.79sec, 23/100ths outside Liz van Welie's national record. Norfolk has broken New Zealand records for the 200m and 400m freestyle at the championships but narrowly missed out on advancing to the finals in both.
The men's medley relay team showed significant improvement to grab a New Zealand record and 11th placing overall.
- NZPA
