Phelps set new world mark on day two

Dinesh WEERAWANSA reporting from China

Records continued to tumble at the Beijing Olympics with American swim sensation Michael Phelps setting up a new world mark at the Beijing Water Cube.

The 23-year-old Baltimore lad set a new world record time of four minutes and 03.84 seconds in the men’s 400m Individual Medley final on Day 2 of the Olympic swimming competition.

Phelps lowered his previous world mark of 4:05.25 set earlier this year at the 2008 US Swimming Trials in Omaha, Nebraska. Coming in second and third place were Laszlo Cseh (4:06.16) of Hungary and Ryan Lochte (4:08.09) of the United States.

Phelps’ win gives him the first gold medal in his quest to break the record of seven gold medals in one Olympics, set by fellow countryman Mark Spitz in the 1972 Munich Games.

Winning six gold medals in Athens in 2004 already placed Phelps joint second on the list for the most gold medals at a single Olympics, alongside Kristin Otto of then East Germany and Vitaly Scherbo of the Soviet United Team.

There was another new Olympic swim record today. Australian Stephanie Rice took the gold medal in the Women’s 400m Individual Medley and set a new world record with a time of four minutes and 29.45 seconds. Rice sliced nearly two seconds off the previous world record set by Katie Hoff of the United States who finished third in 4:31.71.

Kirsty Coventry of Zimbabwe took the silver medal with a time of 4:29.89.

South Korean Park Tae-hwan accounted for the gold medal in the men’s 400m freestyle, returning a time of three minutes 41.86 seconds.

Zhang Lin of China took the silver medal, clocking 3:42:44. American Larsen Jensen (3:42:78) was third. Alexander Dale Oen of Norway once again reset the Olympic record for the Men’s 100m Breaststroke finishing first in the semifinal round Sunday. The new record time of 59.16 comes a day after Oen and four other swimmers lowered the previous time set by Brendan Hansen in 2004.

Japan’s Kitajima Kosuke (59.55) was placed second with Australian Brenton Rickard (59.65) coming in third. Also qualifying for Monday’s final are: Hugues Duboscq (France), Brendan Hansen (United States), Roman Sludnov (Russia), Mark Gangloff (United States) and Igor Borysik (Ukraine). Hansen is the current world record holder in the event with a time of 59.13 seconds, which he set in Irvine, California in 2006.

The Men’s 100m Breaststroke final will be worked off at 10:30 a.m. (8 a.m. SL time) on Monday.

With a final score of 71-49, the Russian Men’s Basketball team beat Iran in the opening game of the Men’s group A preliminary round tournament at the Beijing Olympic Basketball Gymnasium.

In the women’s basketball tournament matches worked off last evening, Australia beat Belarus 83-64, New Zealand beat Mali 76-72, China beat Spain 67-64, South Korea beat Brazil 68-62, USA beat Czech Republic 97-57 and Russia beat Latvia 62-57.

In women’s soccer, USA edged out Japan one-nil after a scoreless second half while Germany too had an identical win over Nigeria with a blank first half. Sweden and Norway too won their respective first round games against Argentina and New Zealand in similar fashion - one-nil. Brazil had the better of South Korea by two goals to one while Canada held the hosts China to a one-all draw.

In hockey, hosts China scored two goals in the first and another in the second to crush Spain by three goals to nil in their women’s tournament match played this morning.

BEIJING, Sunday.