He also won two medals at the 2012 Olympics – gold in the 100m freestyle and silver in the 4x100m relay – before adding two more this year.
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American Josh Prenot, who came into the Games atop the 2016 world rankings, was second in 2:07.53 and Russia’s Anton Chupkov was third in 2:07.70.
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) – Kazakhstan has its first Olympic swimming medal.
“Last night, I was walking over to my semi-final and Kevin Durant walked in front of me and to be honest with you, I nearly vomited”, Chalmers said.
“I’m very proud to win Kazakhstan’s first medal and make history for my country”, said the 21-year-old from Almaty.
“I just stuck to what I know, that has given me the best results in the past, so trying to do that here as well”. “It definitely shows that the standard of global heats swimming has improved but I believe that’s no indication of the potential they (rival swimmers) have”.
In the first race, stacked with the Olympic champion, 2016 pacesetter McEvoy and China’s current world champion Ning Zetao, Adrian rebounded from a near-disastrous heat swim to swoop from lane eight and win in 47.83s. Coming into this, I didn’t think it was possible.
Chalmers knows it will take time to adjust to being an Olympic gold medallist in one of the most high-profile swimming events.
Until now, Balandin’s biggest achievement was winning three breaststroke gold medals at the 2014 Asian Games.
His final followed teammate Groves collecting a silver medal in the 200m butterfly final – she was just 0.03 seconds behind the victor, Mireia Belmonte Garcia from Spain.
Elsewhere in the pool, Michael Phelps returned from his heroics in winning his record 20th and 21st gold medals, to safely reach the final of the 200m individual medley today.
She’ll also get a gold after swimming in the afternoon preliminaries, though her time wasn’t good enough to land her a spot in the evening final.
She caught front-running Australian Madeline Groves at the 150m mark, and finally got past her to touch in first in 2:04.85, just three-hundredths of a second in front.
Lochte will be right next to him again, ranking second in 1:56.28.
Japan’s Natsumi Hoshi claimed the bronze, beating out Cammile Adams of the United States.
Rainy conditions in Rio on Wednesday forced postponement of the game, and the third-seeded Chan sisters were scheduled to take on the Swiss pair late last night. Her younger sister Bronte was fifth-fastest at 53.29.
They’ve already teamed up to lead Australia to a gold medal in the 4×100 freestyle relay.
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While swimming remains one of the powerhouse Olympic sports, golf returns today for the first time since the 1904 Games in St Louis, Missouri, when George Lyon of Canada won the men’s title.
