■SUIT MALFUNCTIONS
AFP, ROME
The high-tech suits that have rocked swimming have their drawbacks, as US swimmer Tyler Clary found when a rip in his polyurethane marvel had him scrambling to make his World Championship heat yesterday.
Clary was preparing to swim the 200m butterfly preliminaries when his Jaked suit ripped over his backside. Fortunately he had a backup, but once he had wormed his way into the skin-tight suit he couldn’t see the approval stamp required by the world’s governing body FINA. Without it, he couldn’t race.
Soothing words from his coaches helped the 20-year-old calm down and he went to his backup.
“I put this one on and I couldn’t see the tag. I took it off, saw the tag,” said Clary, who pulled it on again and went on to clock the third-fastest qualifying time in the fly preliminaries behind Poland’s Pawel Korzeniowski and Michael Phelps.
■SWIMMERS MISSING
REUTERS, ROME
Two swimmers from Djibouti have gone missing from the world championships, an Italian police source said yesterday.
Hassan Ahmed Harbi was scheduled to race in yesterday’s 50m men’s breaststroke heats, but did not start. Houmed Hassan Ali had been on the entry list for the 100m freestyle in Rome.
They have been missing since Monday and police are looking for them.
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