Swimming: Olympic freestyle relay hopefuls come up short

By TERRY MADDAFORD


New Zealand's hopes of having a women's 4x200m freestyle relay team at next year's Olympics remain in the balance.

The quartet who were sensationally disqualified at this year's world championships in Barcelona when Auckland's Hannah McLean was ruled to have broken at the start of her leg, swam in the US Open championships in Seattle last night but came up short.

Needing to swim faster than the 8m 13.13s Brazil recorded to be 12th fastest in Barcelona - and thus press their case for an Olympic invitation - Alison Fitch, Helen Norfolk, McLean and Liz van Welie managed 8m 14.80s in finishing second behind Canada (8m 14.56s).

While that time ranks 23rd on Fina's ranking list, it is good enough for 17th when just one time from each country is taken into account.

New Zealand Swimming officials are hoping the New Zealand record of 8m 13.15s set by the Auckland team of Fitch, McLean, Sarah Catherwood and Norfolk at this year's national championships might still be good enough for the Olympic invitation.

That time still ranks 16th in the world - down to 13th on the basis of one per country - and would be good enough for the required top 16, provided there are no faster times before May's cut-off.

The "unofficial" 8m 08s swum but discounted at the world championships would have been good enough for eighth in the world.

Last night New Zealand held the advantage after Fitch swam 2m 02.21s and Norfolk 2m 02.94s but the Canadians were quicker as McLean set 2m 04.53s and van Welie 2m 05.12s.