Sunday, November 9, 2008

Tao Li bags silver and bronze in Moscow

TAO Li claimed her fourth podium finish in as many World Cup events when she bagged a bronze in the 50m butterfly at the Fina/Arena World Cup Moscow leg yesterday.

She finished in 25.78sec - rewriting her personal best of 25.93, set at the Singapore Sports School pool a week ago.

Sweden's Therese Alshammar (25.53) and Australia's World Cup series leader Marieke Guehrer (25.58) were first and second respectively.

A day earlier, Tao Li claimed silver in the 100m butterfly. This, despite only just making the final.

She sealed the last qualification spot in the heats with her 1:00.41 effort, which edged out Russia's Irina Bespalova by a mere 0.04sec.

'I went all out in the heats,' said the 18-year-old Singapore schoolgirl of her performance in the short- course (25m) event. 'But I was worried that I didn't make the final.'

She did. And she made it count, finishing second in 58.50, behind Guehrer (56.97). Russia's Maria Ugolkova finished third in 59.08.

Just a week earlier, Tao Li got her 2008 World Cup campaign off to a flyer when she won the 100m butterfly gold and 50m butterfly bronze in the Singapore leg.

She said: 'I'm quite happy that I came in second in Moscow. But my time wasn't that good.'

Indeed, she did not finish as strongly as her 56.85 effort that won her gold on home soil.

But her coach Peter Churchill was reasonably pleased with her performance.

He said: 'There have been some challenges, and she's responded fairly well to them.'

The swimmer had arrived in Moscow only on Thursday night with Churchill and teammates Amanda Lim, Shana Lim and Ho Shu Yong. The team had to endure a 20-hour plane ride - including a transit in Dubai.

That was followed by a two-hour bus ride to their hotel in the Russian capital.

As Churchill pointed out: 'There hasn't been a lot of rest.'

Moreover, training is starting to pick up for Tao Li, after she took a two-month break following her heroics at August's Beijing Olympics, where she finished fifth in the 100m butterfly.

She will be looking to add to her medal haul when she competes in the remaining two legs in Stockholm and Berlin.

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