By Phillip Whitten<\/p>\n
EAST MEADOW, New York, March 25. AUBURN\u2019S Fred Bousquet did it the hard way. But he did it.<\/p>\n
The Frenchman, defending NCAA champion in the 50 free, almost didn\u2019t make it back for the evening\u2019s finals today. In the prelims he clocked 21.94, tying Lithuanian Rolandas Gimbutis for the eighth and final spot.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was very mad at myself,\u201d he said. I was national champion. My mother traveled all the way from France and my sister came from Israel just to see me swim, and I wasn\u2019t even in the finals,\u201d Bousquet said. \u201cI was in a swim-off for the last spot.<\/p>\n
\u201cI needed to be mad and our guys knew it. They made me feel good that I could swim faster and they made me feel ashamed. So I knew I had to win the swim-off.<\/p>\n
\u201cI knew this guy (Gimbutis) from European meets in the last three or four years. He\u2019s a tall guy and I knew that if he was ahead at the 25, he would win.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gimbutis was never ahead. Bousquet got a great start and touched in 21.50 to Gimbutis\u2019s 22.17. The Frenchman was in the final \u2013 in lane 8.<\/p>\n
Lane 8 is not a bad place to be. In the final, Bousquet got another good start and simply smoked the field. When he touched in 21.10, the crowd roared its appreciation. It was a new world record, cracking the former standard of 21.13 by Britain\u2019s Mark Foster in 2001.<\/p>\n
FINALS RESULTS
\nEVENT: 4 MEN's 50 Meter Freestyle <\/p>\n
NCAA Record: :21.21 Anthony Ervin California 2000
\nWorld Record: :21.13 Mark Foster GBR 2001
\nAmerican Record: :21.21 Anthony Ervin California 2000
\nUS Open Record: :21.21 Anthony Ervin California 2000
\nQUALIFYING FOR "A" Cut: :19.74
\nQUALIFYING FOR Meet Qualifying: :19.96<\/p>\n
RESULTS of FINALS <\/p>\n
RANK NAME YEAR TEAM PRELIM TIME<\/p>\n
CHAMPIONSHIP FINAL <\/p>\n
1) BOUSQUET, FRED JR AUBURN :21.94 :21.10**
\n ** World Record: NCAA Record: US Open Record:
\n 2) CROCKER, IAN SR TEXAS :21.44 :21.53
\n 3) WOCHOMURKA, RYAN JR AUBURN :21.62 :21.59
\n 4) DUJE, DRAGANJA JR CAL. BERKELEY :21.53 :21.61
\n 5) GIBB, DEREK SR AUBURN :21.69 :21.69
\n 6) FERNS, LYNDON SO ARIZONA :21.73 :21.73
\n 7) SCHNELL, ANDREW SR STANFORD :21.91 :21.94
\n 8) LaFLEUR, ERIC SR ARIZONA :21.62 :21.95 <\/p>\n
CONSOLATION FINAL <\/p>\n
9) GREVERS, MATT FR NORTHWESTERN :21.96 :22.01
\n 10) JAYME, CARLOS SR FLORIDA :22.10 :22.08
\n 11) BRUNELLI, NICK SR ARIZONA STATE :21.98 :22.10
\n 12) GIMBUTIS, ROLANDAS FR CAL. BERKELEY :21.94 :22.13
\n 13) O'BRYAN, BOBBY SR STANFORD :22.09 :22.20
\n 14) CAVIC, MILORAD SO CAL. BERKELEY :22.07 :22.27
\n 15) GUERALDI, RENATO SR CAL. BERKELEY :21.99 :22.33
\n 16) ROSE, MATT SR TEXAS A&M :22.05 :22.36<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Phillip Whitten EAST MEADOW, New York, March 25. AUBURN\u2019S Fred Bousquet did it the hard way. But he did it. The Frenchman, defending NCAA champion in the 50 free,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-zzzzzzzzz"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\r\n