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| Saturday, 21 August 2004 |
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Lankan swimmers 'drown' Dinesh Weerawansa reporting from Greece ATHENS, Friday - Sri Lankans swimmers failed to justify their presence as Menaka de Silva too cut a sorry figure in women's 50m freestyle heats on the eighth day of the XXV111th summer Olympiad here today. Following the men's 100m butterfly first round exit of Conrad Francis last morning, his team mate De Silva too did nothing to justify their inclusion in the Sri Lanka contingent for the 202-nation Games in the Greek capital. Competing in lane seven of the women's 50m freestyle first round qualifying heat four, Menaka de Silva clocked an unimpressive 28.93 seconds to take the sixth place. The particular heat was won by Melanie Slowing (GUA) who returned timing of 27.44 seconds, far ahead of the Lankan lass. Coming in second place of women's 50m freestyle heat four was Maria Tregubova (NDA - 28.40), followed by Roshendra Vrolijk (ARU - 28.43), Jakie Wellman (Zambia - 28.56), Geraldine Arce (NCA - 28.73), De Silva (Sri Lanka - 28.93), Dohi Eliane Droubry (CIV - 29.23) and Sade Daal (SUR - 29.27). De Silva was placed 52nd in the overall timings after the ten first round heats. The best timing among the ten women who won the heats came from Inge de Bruijn. The Dutch lass, who also holds both the World and Olympic record of the event after her historic feat (24.13) in Sydney four years ago, clocked 24.66 seconds in winning the heat No. 10. None of the remaining competitors were able to swim under 25 seconds with the second best being American Kara Lynn Joyce (25.06). It is pity that the two Lankan swimmers could not come out even with their personal best timings. Both De Silva and Francis came here as wildcard entries offered. True one could not expect them to perform miracles but at least they should have come somewhere near their personal bests, the simplest of the targets. Francis had an entry timing of 56.36 seconds in men's 100m butterfly but clocked only 56.80 (fifth) in being eliminated from the first round. The story was no different in the case of De Silva. She had an entry timing of 28.48 seconds in women's 50m free but she eventually clocked just 28.93 (sixth) in saying good bye to Olympic Aqua Centre pool today. |
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