Africa: Van der Burgh Wins 6th-Straight 50 Breast Medal

2017 FINA WORLD SWIMMING CHAMPIONSHIPS

As predictable as death, taxes and Cameron van der Burgh winning a medal in the 50 breast at World Championships.

Van der Burgh won a medal for the 7th-straight World Champs meet in the 50 breast today, going 26.60 for bronze. That makes a 6-year run that matches and even tops some of the biggest-name swimmers in history. For example, Michael Phelps‘ longest streak in a single event is 5, a run from 2003 to 2011 in the 100 fly. Ryan Lochte, too, has a run of 5 in the 200 back (2005 to 2013); so does Aaron Peirsol (2001 to 2009).

On the women’s side, Italy’s Federica Pellegrini set her own record today, winning her 7th-straight medal in the 200 free, a gold over Katie Ledecky.

Van der Burgh now has 2 world titles, a silver and 3 bronzes in the 50 breast over the past decade:

  • 2007: bronze
  • 2009: gold
  • 2011: bronze
  • 2013: gold
  • 2015: silver
  • 2017: bronze

Meanwhile his teammate Chad le Clos won a 200 fly title with one of the gutsiest swims imaginable. Always a furious front-half swimmer, le Clos went out a full second faster than the field, then hung on as his back two splits rose dramatically. He topped Hungary’s Laszlo Cseh by four tenths of a second. That made him Africa’s first medalist of the 2017 World Championships, getting in one event before van der Burgh’s.

Here’s a quick look at le Clos’ splitting compared to the rest of the 200 fly final:

By 50

1st 50 2nd 50 3rd 50 4th 50 Final
Chad le Clos 24.56 28.65 30.09 30.03 1:53.33
Laszlo Cseh 25.33 29.31 29.41 29.67 1:53.72
Daiya Seto 25.27 29.31 29.70 29.93 1:54.21
Tamas Kenderesi 25.41 28.91 29.63 30.78 1:54.73
Jack Conger 25.66 29.12 30.07 30.03 1:54.88
Masato Sakai 25.52 29.19 29.89 30.44 1:55.04
Viktor Bromer 25.91 29.19 29.79 30.41 1:55.30
Antani Ivanov 25.61 29.25 30.45 30.67 1:55.98

Le Clos had the best 1st and 2nd 50s by a wide margin. But his third split was the 2nd-slowest of the field, and his final split tied for 3rd-fastest.

By 100

1st 100 2nd 100 Final
Chad le Clos 53.21 1:00.12 1:53.33
Laszlo Cseh 54.64 59.08 1:53.72
Daiya Seto 54.58 59.63 1:54.21
Tamas Kenderesi 54.32 1:00.41 1:54.73
Jack Conger 54.78 1:00.10 1:54.88
Masato Sakai 54.71 1:00.33 1:55.04
Viktor Bromer 55.10 1:00.20 1:55.30
Antani Ivanov 54.86 1:01.12 1:55.98

Le Clos did manage to have the 4th-fastest back half of the field, but was more than a second slower than Cseh, who was running him down into the wall. His first 100, though, crushed Cseh by 1.4 seconds. The only swimmer who tried to go out with le Clos was Tamas Kenderesi, who fell right into the le Clos trap with a big opening 100, but not enough gas to come home. Kenderesi faded to the field’s worst closing split and took 4th.

AFRICAN RECAP

NATIONAL RECORDS, DAY 4

  • Angolan record – Catarina Sousa – W 50 back – 32.24
  • Swazi record- Robyn Young – W 50 back – 35.46
  • Comorian record – M. Nazlati – W 50 back – 48.32
  • Egyptian record – Mohamed Samy – M 100 free – 49.42
  • Mauritian record – Bradley Vincent – M 100 free – 50.38
  • Namibian record – Xander Skinner – M 100 free – 51.00
  • Burundian record – Billy-Scott Irakoze – M 100 free – 56.93
  • Ugandan record – E. Tibatemwa – M 100 free – 58.79
  • Togolese – K. Amegashi – M 100 free – 1:11.13
  • Kenyan record – Mixed 4×100 medley relay – 4:08.84
  • Angolan record – Mixed 4×100 medley relay – 4:15.68

DAY 4 MEDALS/FINALISTS – AFRICA

Total Gold Silver Bronze
South Africa 2 1 1

Le Clos and Van Der Burgh become the first two medalists for the continent this year, along with the first two finalists. Algeria’s Sahnoune nearly became the third finalist with a 9th-place finish in the 100 free. He’s now the fifth semifinalist from Africa this year, joining Egypt’s Marwan el-Kamash and South Africa’s Myles Brown.

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anonymoose
6 years ago

“Always a furious front-half swimmer, le Clos”… no,wrong! WRONG! look at 2011 le clos, look at 2012 le clos, look at 200 fly final in london le clos.. we was always going out rather slow and coming back like a train. for example in london when he won olypmic gold he went out only 54.06 and came back in an incredible 58.90(!). thats a 4.84 sec difference. now he had a 6.91 difference. he simply got worse, sadly

About Jared Anderson

Jared Anderson

Jared Anderson swam for nearly twenty years. Then, Jared Anderson stopped swimming and started writing about swimming. He's not sick of swimming yet. Swimming might be sick of him, though. Jared was a YMCA and high school swimmer in northern Minnesota, and spent his college years swimming breaststroke and occasionally pretending …

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