Haley Anderson of the US yesterday defended her 5km open water title to claim the first medal of the FINA World Championships.
She surged to the lead in the closing meters of the race in the choppy, brownish waters of the Kazanka River, hitting the touchpad in 58 minutes, 48.4 seconds.
Anderson, the 2012 Olympic 5k silver medalist from Granite Bay, California, used the shorter race as a tune-up for the 10k next week.
Photo: AP
“I just wanted to be able to get on the course, feel it out,” she said. “My strategy was just to stay toward the front, because it’s a short race. You got to kind of stay up there if you want to be able to make your move toward the end.”
Kalliopi Araouzou of Greece took silver in 58 minutes, 49.8 seconds, while Finnia Wunram of Germany earned bronze in 58 minutes, 51.0 seconds.
Sharon van Rouwendaal of the Netherlands led most of the way on the wind-whipped rectangular course, but settled for fourth in 58 minutes, 55.1 seconds — more than 7 seconds behind Anderson.
The water temperature was 20oC, while the air temperature was 23oC at the course near the Kazan Kremlin, built at the behest of Ivan the Terrible in the 16th century.
“The water wasn’t too cold, which was nice,” Anderson said. “A little choppy, but it’s choppy for everybody, it’s cold for everybody. It was nice out there.”
Anderson won the 5k race at the worlds two years ago in Barcelona, Spain, where the water temperature in the city’s harbor was warm, but swimmers criticized the conditions as dirty and smelly.
Numerous boats carefully tracked the field of 41 swimmers, who were strung out after the lead pack. The water is 4m deep on the course — two times deeper than the FINA standard. The bottom of the river in the competition area was cleaned beforehand.
“The quality of the Kazanka water conforms to all the sanitary norms,” said Dmitry Mikhailov, a Russian deputy director-general for sports projects.
Anderson’s teammate, Ashley Twichell, was sixth.
Like the US, Australia placed both of its swimmers in the top 10. Jessica Walker was fifth and Melissa Gorman tied for seventh with Anastasia Krapivina of Russia.
Chad Ho of South Africa won the men’s 5k in 55 minutes, 17.6 seconds, the same time as silver medalist Rob Muffels of Germany. Matteo Furlan of Italy earned bronze in 55 minutes, 20.0 seconds.
“I couldn’t ask for a better race,’’ Ho said.
David Heron of the US was sixth and teammate Alex Meyer finished 11th.
The start and finish of the open water events is directly under the 27m-tall tower that is to be used for the high diving competition next week.
Diving and synchronized swimming medals were scheduled to be awarded later yesterday. In the debut of mixed duet synchro at the worlds, the Russian duo of Darina Valitova and Aleksandr Maltsev was first with 88.85 points in the technical preliminary.
US participants Christina Jones and Bill May were second at 86.71, while the Italian duo of Manila Flamini and Giorgio Minisini was third with 84.07. The final is today.
May is back in the sport after retiring 10 years ago. He has been performing in a Cirque du Soleil show in Las Vegas.
“It’s very exciting for the sport and for men in synchronized swimming,’’ he said. “We have a lot of support from our families, friends, coaches, so we are lucky.’’
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