Alice Tai and Maisie Summers-Newton highlighted the first day of the 2018 British Para Swimming International with world records in their respective classes.
Tai, the Commonwealth Games silver medalist, set a new world record in her first swim in the S8 class. She had previously competed in the S9 class, but per the BBC, she was moved into S8 prior to this week’s meet. Her 1:03.66 is actually a half-second slower than she went in taking silver at Commonwealths in April. The world record is currently listed at 1:04.51 from the Commonwealths gold medalist, Australia’s Lakeisha Patterson. Patterson was 1:03.02 at Commonwealths in the S8 class, but her record still has to be ratified and her classification confirmed for that to stand up as the new mark.
Meanwhile the 15-year-old Summers-Newton took down the SB6 world mark in the 100 breast. She took down a different Australian, Tiffany Thomas Kane, who previously held the mark at 1:34.95. Summers-Newton was 1:33.92.
The multi-class events were ranked by total points, allowing a winner in each event. Tai and Summers-Newton both won their races. Other event winners in PWS (World Para Swimming Series) events from day 1 were:
- Daniel Dias (S5)in the men’s 100 free (1:09.81 – 940 points)
- Nelson Crispin (SB6) in the men’s 100 breast (1:18.96 – 990 points)
- P Pereira dos Santos (SB3) in the women’s 50 breast (1:03.18 – 631 points)
- Takayuki Suzuki (SB3) in the men’s 50 breast (49.90 – 864 points)
Tia new WR 100 bk not bad for the new GB swimmer
A world record by 4 seconds nonetheless!
GBs Alice Tai S10 – S8 v Oliver Hynd S8 – S9 is an all round head scratcher, Kearneys S5 is just whacko & the UKR male S10s remaining classifiable is interesting. Other than that it was ‘looking’ reasonable. The ratification of WRs to swimmers who only have a confirmed or review with fixed date status is sensible & that explains why the records set by Patterson in 2018 haven’t been ratified. However, how someone who is under ‘observation’ during the meet can set a WR is a bit of a wrinkle so this could be more of an afterthought rather than an attempt at putting the brakes on or any cleverness on the IPCs part.
Swimmers setting WRs… Read more »
Do people think the new classification of all the athletes is going well? It seems to me that a lot of people are having their classes changed and there is a lot of chaos in the system right now. Tai went from being a s10 in Rio two years ago to an s9 last year to an s8 this year? And her disability is club feet which has been corrected already? Maybe someone can explain how she got moved down two classes for this minimal disability.
Nobody can explain it; The whole system is a crock of ****.