World Championships: United States Owns 800 Freestyle Relay Qualifying

By John Lohn

MELBOURNE, Australia, March 29. PROPELLED by a splendid leadoff leg by Peter Vanderkaay, the United States easily posted the top time of the preliminaries of the 800 freestyle relay. Vanderkaay produced an opening split of 1:46.67 and was joined by Jayme Cramer, David Walters and Klete Keller for a mark of 7:10.99. The United States should be unbeatable tonight. While Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte will be added to the lineup for the championship final, teaming with Vanderkaay and likely Keller.

Keller has been off his usual form and split 1:48.60 in the morning, well off his personal best of 1:45.53 from Greece and the slowest of the morning. Cramer was in at 1:47.97 and Walters went 1:47.75. With Phelps, Lochte and Vanderkaay on the unit, there's a good chance the United States can break the world record of 7:04.66 if it receives a solid fourth contribution.

The second seed for the evening final was Australia with a time of 7:14.84, ahead of the 7:16.00 produced by Canada. Andrew Hurd had the best split for the Canadian crew, going 1:47.63. Meanwhile, Italy secured the fourth position and is likely to improve on its 7:17.42 tonight when Filippo Magnini is presumably placed on the relay. Rounding out the field for the night were Japan (7:17.45), Russia (7:18.14), Great Britain (7:18.82) and Poland (7:18.93).

Click Here to view event results PDF file.

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