Welingtonian Lewis Clareburt has certainly lived up to all the promise he showed at the 2018 Commonwealth Games and the Tokyo Olympics with his swimming in Birmingham.
Clareburt already had gold medals in Birmingham in the 400m individual medley and 200m butterfly and he added to that tally with a slightly surprising bronze medal in the 200m individual medley.
The 200m is fairly short for Clareburt in the individual medley and in his morning heat he qualified only sixth, though he said later he was cruising and conserving his energy as best he could.
But in the final Clareburt proved to be one of the big three, along with Duncan Scott of Scotland and Tom Dean of England.
In the end Scott won in 1min 56.88s, Dean was second in 1min 57.01s and Clareburt, using his strength and freestyle speed, rushed home third in 1min 57.59s. He had a huge gap of 1.36s over the fourth placegetter.
Clareburt’s time was nearly 13 seconds faster than his qualifying time.
Reflecting on his experience in Birmingham, he said he was not sure of winning one medal when he arrived, so to win three, two of them gold, has made for a really special time.
He said he was learning how to deal with pressure and working on improving his skills – such as his turns, his breaststroke - but that there was more scope to improve.
Dunedin swimmer Erika Fairweather, the fastest qualifier in the women’s 400m freestyle, had to settle for fourth in a high-class final.
The final was won by Australian Ariarne Titmus in 3min 35.06s from Canadian sensation Summer McIntosh. Fairweather’s time was a very slick 4min 03.84s.
Fairweather’s teammate Erin Thomas was sixth in 4min 09.73s
Fairweather clocked 4min 07.27s to earn fastest qualifier status and Thomas got through her heat in 4min 11.50s, a fine effort considering she had to shrug off the effects of the gruelling 800m freestyle final the previous evening.
Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games
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