American Men Miss World Record in 800 Free Relay by Whisker

VICTORIA, British Columbia, Aug. 18. THE American contingent of Michael Phelps, Ryan Lochte, Peter Vanderkaay and Klete Keller came within .62 seconds of downing the five-year-old global standard of 7:04.66 currently held by the Australians with a 7:05.28 en route to a meet record in the 800-meter freestyle relay at the 2006 Mutual of Omaha Pan Pacific Championships. Still, the Americans notched a national record.

“We’re happy with that,” Phelps said. “We broke the American record and were sixth-tenths away from the world record. Four years ago, we weren’t even in the same universe as that world record. So that’s exciting for us and is going to give us more motivation for the next year.”

Phelps matched Katie Hoff’s gold-medal trifecta by leading off the relay with a smoking 1:45.91 to pace the American quartet out to a three-second advantage. Lochte followed that effort with the quickest second leg of the race in 1:47.34 before giving way to Vanderkaay’s 1:46.49 split in the third part of the relay.

Keller captured his second gold of the meet, after winning the 200-meter freestyle last night, by coming home in 1:45.54 to stop the clock in 7:05.28 for the United States that also surpassed the 7:08.79 meet record previously held by the Australians since 1999.

Meanwhile, the Canadian team of Brian Johns, Andrew Hurd, Brent Hayden and Colin Russell wound up with silver in 7:12.39, while Australia’s squad of Leith Brodie, Andrew Mewing, Nicholas Ffrost and Kenrick Monk cruised to bronze in 7:17.21.

Click Here to view event results PDF file

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