DAVIES TAKES WORLD SILVER
Britain's open water swimmers continued their excellent performance
at the World Open Water Swimming Championships as David Davies
claimed the silver medal and guaranteed his nomination to
the Olympic team in the men's 10km race.
The Olympic bronze medallist went into the event with only
one open water race under his belt, but showed no signs of
nerves as he gained an excellent start and dominated the pack
to take an early lead.
The British champion controlled the tempo of the race and
as the swimmers approached the 2.5km mark Davies was closely
followed by Olympic champion Grant Hackett.
At the halfway mark the pack began to stretch out and the
top three Davies, Valerio Cleri (Italy) and Hackett began
to pull away.
Hackett struggled as the race entered 7.5km and found the
experience of Russian world champion Vladimir Dyatchin and
Thomas Lurz (Germany) too much as he began to fall back through
the field.
Davies continued his dominance of the race until the final
turning buoy where Dyatchin managed to just push past him
to take the lead as they entered the final 500m. As they hit
the final 200m Davies closed the gap on Dyatchin and they
were swimming length for length but Dyatchin just clinched
the gold in a time of 1:53.21.0.
Davies took his second world silver medal of 2008 and his
nomination to the first British open water Olympic team with
a time of 1:53.21.3.
"I am very very pleased with that result," Davies
said. "That race took a lot out of me, I feel like I
have done twelve rounds with Mike Tyson.
"That was my first competitive 10km swim, in South Africa
there was only six athletes competing, so the conditions here
were perfect for me gain experience in the event. I am a rhythmic
swimmer and so we planned for me to get out into the lead
early on and get myself some clear space so I was well out
of the pack.
"When I got into the lead I had no idea what was going
on behind me, I just kept my pace and didn't stop to feed
throughout the race. I did make some mistakes with my lines
and my tactics, but these are things that will come with more
experience of open water swimming.
"Dyatchin got me at the last turn and he used his experience
to make me swerve towards the turning buoy. But I am pleased
to be able to get that result while I am in the middle of
heavy training.
"I was not rested going into that race and I used it
as part of my training programme so for me this is an encouraging
position to be.
"I have had a busy start to 2008 and I am looking forward
to getting back to Loughborough and getting some solid training
under my belt. It is great to know I now have options for
Beijing and I am now going to have discussions with my coach
before we decide my next step."
The bronze medal was taken by Thomas Lurz who touched home
in a time of 1:53.27.2. British swimmer Alan Bircher was also
trying to guarantee his nomination to the Olympic squad but
failed to make an impact against the world-class field and
finished a disappointing 21st with a time of 1:54.44.2.
Hackett finished in 15th place but was disqualified from
the field after deliberately preventing another swimmer from
overtaking in the final 300m, this was his second yellow card
of the race.
The British record holder Davies has been training in Loughborough
with Kevin Renshaw for the past eight months and took part
in his first open water swim in February, for Renshaw this
event was a learning curve for both of them.
"We knew that David was obviously one of the most inexperienced
open water swimmers in the competition so we had a good strategy
in place to help him avoid the fight in the pack," Renshaw
said. "It was a good performance from him today and he
now needs to improve every time he takes part in a 10km race.
"He needs to learn how to deal with the hard knocks
of being in the pack, this is hard for a pool swimmer to learn
as they are so used to competing with their own space. Nevertheless,
he is a tough athlete and he puts his heart and soul into
every race he takes part in so I know that he will be able
to learn from this and improve for next time."
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