Records tumble in Moscow

2009/11/08

MOSCOW: Marieke Guehrer (above) and Evelyn Verraszto were the stars on a record-breaking opening day of the Moscow leg of Fina's World Cup series here on Friday.

Australia's Marieke, the overall winner of the series in 2008, claimed two gold medals as she set a new world record of 26.17sec in the women's 50m backstroke in the short course competition.

The 23-year-old from Melbourne broke the previous mark of 26.23, set by Croatia's Sanja Jovanovic at Rijeka, Croatia on Dec 13, 2008.

She also won the 50m freestyle ahead of Hinkelien Schreuder of the Netherlands and Swede Therese Alshammar.

Hungary's Evelyn proved to be the revelation on the first of the two-day competition as she set a new record in the 200m individual medley.

The 20-year-old clocked 2:06.01 to better the 2:06.13 achieved by Zimbabwe's Kirsty Coventry in Manchester, England on April 12, 2008.

Her time was the best in the World Cup competition as well since 2003.

Hosts Russia had a successful opening day winning four of the nine men's titles with South Africa's men taking three gold.

Russia's Sergey Fesikov took two gold -- the 100m freestyle and the 100m individual medley -- and compatriot Nikita Lobintsev the 400m freestyle.

Cameron Van Der Burgh lead a South African sweep of the men's 50m breaststroke ahead of Roland Schoeman and Neil Versfeld.

Schoeman went on to win the 50m butterfly ahead of Russian Evgeny Korotyshkin and compatriot Lyndon Ferns, as Versfeld won the 200m breaststroke.

Australian women took three of the eight gold on offer with Felicity Galvez winning the 100m butterfly to add to Marieke's two gold. -- AFP