Beijing Olympic Games

Updated: 2007-07-19 From: Xinhuanet

RIO DE JANEIRO, July 18 (Xinhua) — Swimmers from host Brazil continued their strong performance at the 15th Pan American Games, winning three out of seven gold medals on offer on Wednesday.

Kaio Marcio Almeida led a one-two Brazilian finish in the men’s100m butterfly, winning the gold at 52.05 to break the previous Pan American Games record.

His compatriot Gabriel Mangabeira settled for the silver at 52.43 and albert Subirats of Venezuela took the bronze with 52.78.

The men’s 100m freestyle title was also won by Brazil through Cesar Cielo Filho who was timed at 48.79 seconds. Jose Martin Meolans of Argentina edged Gabriel Woodward of the United States for the silver medal at 49.42.

Rebeca Gusmao is the first female swimming to win a swimming gold for Brazil at the 15th Pan Am Games. She outs printed Ariene Semeco of Venezuela and Vanessa Garcia Vega of Puerto Rico in the 50m freestyle final.

Gusmao was happy about her victory: “I’ve always had difficulties to achieve things. By the end of last year it was even worse. I trained alone, stayed in the pool for hours and I even thought of giving up. But we always have people to motivate us and one of them has been my husband. He even offered to train with me every morning.”

Gusmao said she felt sorry for the air crash in Sao Paulo on Tuesday: “I knew about it yesterday when a journalist interviewed me and asked about it. I hope there are no athletes among the dead and I pray for the families of the people involved in the accident. I hope it is not as big as it seems.”

The United States also won three gold medals on Tuesday. Matt Patton led all the way to take the title of men’s 400m freestyle, beating his teammate Tobias Work and Armando Negreiros of Brazil to the second and third places respectively.

Kathleen Hersey added one gold to the Americans’ haul, winning the women’s 100m butterfly at 59.21 seconds. The silver medal went to Sam Woodward, also from the United States, at 59.98, and the bronze was won by Gabriella Silva of Brazil at 1:00.50.

The American quartet of Jessica Rodriquez, Emily Kukors, Ava Ohlgren and Kaite Carroll eased to the victory of women’s 4X200 freestyle relay. Their winning time of 8:02.03 beat the previous meet record of 8:05.28 but was well off the world record of 7:50.09 which was also set by Americans in Melbourne world championship last March.

“We don’t see ourselves as the best. The United States are not participating with their main swimmers, so they can give a chance to the new athletes to be in the competitions.” said Ava Ohlgren.

Canada managed to win a gold in the swimming pool on Wednesday through Scott Dickens whose winning time of 1:01.20 was merely 0.04 seconds ahead of Mark Gangloff of the United States. Another Canadian Mathieu Bois finished third at 1:01.83.