Ingram Swims to Gold Medal and Record in FINA World Cup

Outstanding New Zealand swimmer Melissa Ingram has won a gold medal on the opening night of finals at the FINA ARENA World Cup in Beijing.

The 26 year old from Swimming New Zealand’s High Performance Centre has broken her own national record in the process.

Ingram took out the women’s 200m backstroke in an exciting final, holding off China’s Yanxin Zhou by just 1/100th of a second after the hometown swimmer was roared on by a partisan local crowd.

Ingram, coached by Scott Talbot, topped qualifiers comfortably and took nearly a one second lead at the halfway mark in the final. The Chinese swimmer closed to 0.3s at the 150m mark but the New Zealander showed her experience to hold on for the victory by the narrowest of margins.

Her winning time of 2:03.00 took virtually a second off her previous New Zealand record set at the World Cup in Singapore last year, achieved off the back of her peak form at the Commonwealth Games in Delhi.

Earlier Ingram qualified seventh fastest in the heats of the 200m freestyle but withdrew from the final to concentrate on the 200m backstroke final.

Young Auckland swimmer Jessica Marston finished seventh in the final of the women’s 800m freestyle final. The West Auckland Aquatics club teenager clocked 8:47.66, nearly a second faster than her effort in finishing fourth at the previous World Cup in Singapore at the weekend.

The pair will contest the 400m freestyle tonight with Ingram also in the 100m backstroke.
Results, FINA ARENA World Cup, Beijing:

800m freestyle: Lili Zhou (CHN) 8:18.79, 1; Shiyue Cao (CHN) 8:30.94, 2; Jing Liu (CHN) 8:31.07, 3. Also: Jessica Marston (NZL) 8:47.66, 7.
200m backstroke: Melissa Ingram (NZL) 2:03.00, 1; Yanxin Zhou (CHN) 2:03.01, 2; Yige Yao (CHN) 2:05.78, 3.