Related News

Home » Sports » Swimming

'Water hater' Peaty sets new 50m breaststroke world record

GREAT Britain's Adam Peaty set a new world record of 26.62sec in the 50m breaststroke at the European Championships before revealing he hated swimming when he was a child.

The 19-year-old took 0.05sec off Cameron van der Burgh's world record from the 2009 World Championships when the performance-enhancing supersuits era was at its peak.

It is a far cry from the little boy who was so scared of water he would not go in the bath or the shower.

As for swimming, he admitted: "I hated the pool."

He overcame his fears and the last weeks have been a fairytale -- although a well-deserved one -- for the Englishman who claimed two golds and one silver medal at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.

His coach Mel Marshall -- winner of world, European and Commonwealth medals -- gave him four days off after his exertions in Scotland.

But Peaty texted her asking if he could return to training early in order to prepare for the Europeans.

He came to Berlin where he won the 100m breaststroke and was part of the Great Britain mixed medley relay squad that set a new world record on the same evening on Friday.

His world record came in the second semi-final prompting a look of disbelief from the teenager who sat on the lane rope blinking as he absorbed the information on the scoreboard.

However, he knows he still has hard work to do on Saturday with the final to come.

He said: "I feel absolutely amazing. I had to look at that scoreboard about five times before I knew I had broken it.

"I haven't got any words for it. I haven't broken a world record before so I don't know how it feels.

"Hopefully it will sink in by tomorrow so I can get my head down and hopefully get a better performance out of myself. It was not a perfect race due to my final touch so I can still improve.

"It is just great to see all my hard work paying off. I am quite lucky in that most people work really hard and don't see the results as such. I'm ecstatic."

Van der Burgh had mused in Glasgow that Peaty and his fellow Briton Ross Murdoch had reminded the South African of himself at that age.

Of Van der Burgh, who he beat to 100m gold before the tables were turned in the 50m in Scotland, Peaty said: "He was one of my idols since I was a kid.

"I looked on in 2012 and I was like 'if I work that hard I can be like him'."




 

Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.

沪公网安备 31010602000204号

Email this to your friend