Athletes Set More World records at Swimming Championships

World records and thrilling finishes at the 2010 International Paralympic Committee (IPC) Swimming World Championships gave day number four a fantastic feeling inside the Pieter van den Hoogenband Swimming Stadium.

Paralympian Ambassador Kirsten Bruhn (GER) set a new World record in the Women's 100m Backstroke (S7) with a time of 1:23.19. Bruhn was followed by yesterday's World record breaker Mallory Weggemann (USA) and Rebecca Dubber (NZL) respectively. The Men's 100m Backstroke (S7) also had a World record from Great Britain`s Jonathan Fox. Fox was followed by Croatia's Mihovil Spanja and USA's Lantz Lamback.

For the Women's 50m Freestyle (S12), Russia`s Oxana Savchenko set a new World record with 26.96, followed by compatriot Anna Efimenko and Poland`s Joanna Mendak. In the Men`s event, Ukraine's Maksym Veraksa took first, followed by Russia's Alexandr Nevolin-Svetov and USA's Tucker Dupree.

The day inside the stadium began and ended with big finishes, including from Paralympian Natalie du Toit from South Africa, who took the gold in the first Women's event, the 400m Freestyle (S9). The World Championships also had Olympic athlete Pieter van den Hoogenband (NED) visiting the competition and presenting medals to the winning athletes.
Van den Hoogenband said that he was impressed by the strong performance from the athletes.

"I saw some great races and great swimming," van den Hoogenband said. "I am very proud that the Championships are here and that we have a lot of great athletes here who are having fun. But also the level of the swimmers is amazing."

Taking place from 15-21 August, a total of 649 athletes from 53 different countries are participating at the 2010 IPC Swimming World Championships in Eindhoven, the Netherlands. Competing inside the Pieter van den Hoogenband Swimming Stadium for the gold, silver and bronze medal in their respective event, the number of participating athletes and countries is one of the largest of any previous Swimming World Championships.

Watch the Championships live on www.ParalympicSport.TV, every day between 9:00 and 12:00 CET, and 17:00 and 21:00 CET. Highlights clips can also be watched at www.youtoube.com/paralympicsporttv.

For more results and information about the 2010 IPC Swimming World Championships, as well as to purchase tickets to the event, please visit www.wcswimming2010.com.

To read more about Paralympic Swimming athletes, check out the all new full biography section of the IPC’s website at http://www.paralympic.org/Athletes/Athlete_Biographies/.

For more information about IPC Swimming, please visit the official website at www.ipc-swimming.org.

To find the qualification rankings for IPC Swimming, please visit http://www.ipc-swimming.org/rankings/.

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