Ryk Neethling claimed his second gold of the competition on the final evening of the Telkom National Swimming Championships in East London on Saturday night.
Fresh from his 100m freestyle victory on Friday night, the Olympic gold medallist surprised even himself with a speedy victory in the 50m butterfly in 23,89.
This was only the third time Neethling has swum this event (the first and second times having been in the heats and semifinal) and he managed to come within 0,28 of a second of the South African record set by former training partner Roland Schoeman at these championships last year in Durban.
The 27-year-old Bloemfontein-born swimmer admitted afterwards that he was pleasantly surprised with his time, considering he has taken a break from training since winning the World Cup series earlier this year.
”It’s back to normal training tomorrow [Sunday], though, and I’m really looking forward to it,” he explained.
Meanwhile, Lize-Mari Retief was another swimmer to come close to a national record on Saturday night.
The 18-year-old swimmer swam 27,55 for victory in the women’s 50m butterfly, just 0,19 of a second off her own national mark set a few weeks ago.
A botched start in the women’s 100m freestyle took its toll on the favourite for the title, Lauren Roets. The Central Gauteng swimmer did not recover in time for the restart and had to settle for a bronze medal. Rene Mouton won the event in 58,22 with Melissa Corfe second in 58,23.
The 100m backstroke saw a three-way battle between Gerhard Zandberg, George du Rand and German swimmer Marco di Carli. Zandberg eventually took the title in 57 seconds and after Di Carli was disqualified, Du Rand was awarded the silver after finishing in 57,52.
Melissa Corfe claimed the women’s title in 1:05,10.
In the other finals of the evening, Louis Lotter (28,93) and Suzaan van Biljon (33,10) took the 50m breaststroke golds.
And in the 400m individual medley, it was Keri Shaw (4:56,63) and Robin Francis (4;22,65) who took top honours. — Sapa