By guest writer Julia Wilkinson-Minks (2008 & 2012 Canadian Olympian)<\/i><\/p>\n
MERSIN, Turkey, June 24. FOUR days of racing down and only one to go at the Mediterranean Games in Mersin, Turkey, and it doesn't look like any country has a chance to win even half the gold medals that Italy will end up walking away with. <\/p>\n
First off the blocks was Italy's Martina De Memme, who won her third gold medal of the week, this time in the 200-meter freestyle. De Memme won in 1:59.65, the only woman to post a sub-two minute swim. De Memme added this victory to her 400-meter and 800-meter freestyle wins from this Games. <\/p>\n
In the men's 200-meter freestyle, Serbia's Velimir Stjepanovic won handily ahead of second place in 1:47.00. This is Stjepanovic's second win of the Games, winning the 400-meter freestyle on day 1. Olympic champion in the mile and open water, Oussama Mellouli, was second in 1:49.21. <\/p>\n
Farida Osman of Egypt won her country's first medal in the pool, winning gold in the 50-meter butterfly in 26.15. Serbia's Ivan Lendjer won the men's 50-meter butterfly in 23.50, another gold to match his 100-meter butterfly medal from earlier in the Games. <\/p>\n
Italy was victorious in both the women's and men's backstroke events: Elena Gemo won the women's 100-meter in 1:01.57, Matteo Milli won the men's in 55.12. <\/p>\n
Oussama Mellouli of Tunisia was back in action in his premier event, the men's 1500-meter freestyle. The 2008 Olympic gold medalist in this event won in 15:12.36. Italy's Luca Baggio stayed relatively close to Mellouli and finished three seconds behind in 15:15.16. <\/p>\n
Italy was victorious in the final event of the evening, the women's 800-meter freestyle relay. The team of Chiara Masini Luccetti, Diletta Carli, Stefania Pirozzi and Mediterranean Games 200-meter freestyle champion Martina De Memme won well ahead of second-place Spain in 8:07.50.<\/p>\n
Italy has now won 43 medals at the pool during these Mediterranean Games: 16 gold, 18 silver and 9 bronze. The country with the most amount of gold medals after Italy is Serbia, with four, and from a total medal count perspective, Spain is in second with 14. The swimming concludes tomorrow. <\/p>\n
Julia Wilkinson-Minks is a two-time Olympian for Canada and was a finalist in the 200-meter IM at the 2008 Beijing Games. In 2010, she became Texas A&M's first ever NCAA champion in swimming when she won the 100-yard freestyle. She graduated from Texas A&M with a degree in Speech Communication. Julia retired from competitive swimming following the London Olympic Games and now lives in Texas with her husband Shane. <\/p>\n
Follow her on twitter @juliah2o<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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