Dan Wallace has been breaking his own Scottish record in the 200m IM all week, slowly taking chunks off it in prelims, then semifinals, and now finals.
Wallace swam to a fourth place finish in order to break the record he set in semifinals, stopping the clock in 1:57.59 to put a big scare on James Goddard’s British record of 1:57.12 from 2009.
Wallace’s finals splits
- 25.32 (25.32)
- 55.72 (30.40)
- 1:28.93 (33.21)
- 1:57.59 (28.66)
Wallace turned in fourth after the butterfly but quickly fell to seventh after the backstroke leg, his weakest of the four. With the fastest breaststroke split out of the entire field, which includes world record holder Ryan Lochte, Wallace moved up to third, passing China’s Wang Shun.
Wang came home with an unbelievable freestyle split of 27.66 in order to pass Wallace who was a 28.66 on the last 50. Wallace missed the podium by 0.78 seconds.
Collectively Wallace has taken over a second off his record this week. Going into the competition, it originally stood at 1:58.72. In prelims, he lowered that mark to a 1:58.28. In semifinals, he broke 1:58 in order to put up a 1:57.77. He took 0.18 seconds off that mark tonight.
Wallace’s performances in the 200m IM put him in a great position to medal in the 400m IM later on in the meet. The 400 is his best event, and after the success he’s already had a medal is not out of the question.
Well done Big Man. Good luck with the 400IM. From our vantage point, Seto looks well off his game, Clary is a touch slower than he would like, Hagino broke his elbow(ouch)………The Big Man has a great chance.