By Stephen J. Thomas<\/p>\n
ATHENS, Greece August 15. AUSTRALIAN world record-holder Leisel Jones swam the third fastest time in history over the two laps \u2013 1:06.78, breaking the Olympic record set by South African Penny Heyns in Atlanta eight years ago. <\/p>\n
German Sarah Poewe equaled her PR from the Sydney Olympics to clock 1:07.48 for the second spot, with Americans Tara Kirk (1:07.60) and Amanda Beard (1:07.92) and the other Aussie Brooke Hanson (1:07.75) the only swimmers under 1:08.<\/p>\n
China\u2019s Luo Xuejuan (1:08.57) and Qu Hui (1:09.06) made the cut and can\u2019t be discounted.<\/p>\n
Jones, is clearly in the best form of her career. If she can keep her head together tomorrow night, she should finally get her hands on a gold medal after a four-year wait.<\/p>\n
\nWomen 100m Breaststroke Semifinals <\/b><\/p>\n
Record Split Name NOC Location Date
\nWR 1:06.37 31.40
\n JONES Leisel AUS Barcelona (ESP) 21 JUL 2003
\nOR 1:07.02 31.65
\n HEYNS Penelope RSA Atlanta (USA) 21 JUL 1996 <\/p>\n
Event No: 9 <\/p>\n
Rank Heat Lane Name NOC R.T. 50m Time Time
\nBehind
\n1 1 4 JONES Leisel AUS 0.74 31.74 1:06.78
\n35.04 OR
\n2 1 5 POEWE Sarah GER 0.71 31.98 1:07.48
\n35.50 0.70
\n3 2 5 KIRK Tara USA 0.71 31.79 1:07.60
\n35.81 0.82
\n4 2 4 HANSON Brooke AUS 0.77 32.02 1:07.75
\n35.73 0.97
\n5 2 3 BEARD Amanda USA 0.73 32.43 1:07.92
\n35.49 1.14
\n6 1 6 BONDARENKO Svitlana UKR 0.89 32.71 1:08.28
\n35.57 1.50
\n7 1 3 LUO Xuejuan CHN 0.71 32.29 1:08.57
\n36.28 1.79
\n8 2 6 QI Hui CHN 0.81 32.60 1:09.06
\n36.46 2.28 <\/p>\n
9 1 2 TANAKA Masami JPN 0.79 32.90 1:09.11
\n36.21 2.33
\n10 2 7 KOVACS Agnes HUN 0.79 32.37 1:09.12
\n36.75 2.34
\n11 2 1 van OOSTEN Lauren CAN 0.77 33.18 1:09.45
\n36.27 2.67
\n12 2 2 LEIER Rhiannon CAN 0.81 32.53 1:09.46
\n36.93 2.68
\n13 1 7 BERNHARDT Vipa GER 0.75 33.03 1:09.72
\n36.69 2.94
\n14 1 1 JUKIC Mirna AUT 0.77 33.26 1:10.06
\n36.80 3.28
\n15 2 8 BOGOMAZOVA Elena RUS 0.84 33.22 1:10.41
\n37.19 3.63
\n16 1 8 BOGGIATTO Chiara ITA 0.82 33.59 1:10.84
\n37.25<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Stephen J. Thomas ATHENS, Greece August 15. AUSTRALIAN world record-holder Leisel Jones swam the third fastest time in history over the two laps \u2013 1:06.78, breaking the Olympic record<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":71909,"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-7823","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-zzzzzzzzz"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\r\n