Belmonte Misses 200 Fly Finals, Won’t Defend Title

by Robert Gibbs 0

December 07th, 2016 International, News

2016 SHORT COURSE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS

Olympic gold medalist, and short course defending champion and world recorder holder Mireia Belmonte of Spain failed to advance to finals in the women’s 200 butterfly on the second day of the 2016 Short Course World Championships in Windsor.

Swimming in heat 3, the 26 year-old Belmonte touched in 2:10.21, a time that ranked her 19th overall, and just over two seconds shy of making the top 8.  Unlike long course championship meets, the short course world championships only have prelims and finals for events 200m and longer, meaning that only the top eight swimmers from the morning advance to finals.

Two years ago in Doha, Belmonte won this event in a world record time of 1:59.61 in finals, after posting a 2:03.61 in the heats.  This summer, Belmonte became the first Spanish woman to win a gold medal in the Olympics, when she won the 200 fly in Rio with a time of 2:04.85.

Belmonte is in the middle of a heavy schedule this week.  She finished 5th in the 400 IM finals last night, and is slated to also swim the 200 IM, 400 free, and 800 free.  She is currently the short course world record holder in the 400 and 800 freestyles, the latter of which will also be contested this morning.

In This Story

0
Leave a Reply

Subscribe
Notify of

0 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

About Robert Gibbs