Mosse and Hume still have to achieve qualifying standards

Press, 4 March 1988, Page 21

Mosse and Hume still have to achieve qualifying standards

By

KEVIN TUTTY

As the qualifying period for the Seoul Olympic Games draws slowly nearer, two! of New Zealand’s leading swimmers. Anthony Mosse and Sylvia Hume, have still to achieve the Olympic qualifying standards. i i I Mosse and Hume won gold medals at the Edinburgh Commonwealth Games 18 months ago and were expected to have qualified for Seoul by now. 1 Mosse would almost certainly 1 have reached The qualifying time in his specialist event, the 200 m butterfly at the Pan Pacific Games in (Brisbane last October, but'a back injury prevented him from competing. Both!swimmers are at 'university I: in the United States and inj the last few months jtheir racing has been confined to short-course pools. I The New Zealand swimming ! selectors however, have stipulated [that qualifying times ! must be recorded in long- ! course! (50m) pools. Mosse's place in the Olympic team is not in jeopardy. Excluding him from ! the Olympic team would be; like excluding Martin Crowe from the New Zealand cricket team. ; Mosse has I been! ■ recorded ( world class shortcourse' times, and beating the best butterfly swimmers in the United States, in therprocess. |;

Mrs Norma Williams, a member of the New Zealand swimming selection panel, said yesterday she expected that Mosse would produce a long-course qualifying i time before the end of the qualifying period which has !been extended from April 13 to May 1. i Last week-end, Mosse won ,100 and 200 yard butterfly races at an inter-collegiate carnival in 49.4 s and jlmin 47.55. Converted to ! longcourse equivalents the (times were 55.75 and 2min| I.os. The Seoul qualifying times are 55.33 s and 2min 1.255. Hume's situation is not as clear cut! The 100 m [backstroke gold medallist in Edinburgh, she had mediocre times at! the Pan Pacifies. Last week-end, she recorded a fast 200 yard time in the United States, which! converted to a long-course time, was marginally inside the Olympic qualifying time for 200 m backstroke. ■ Mrs Williams said it would be necessary for Hume to record a long-course time inside the qualifying mark,' and she will swim at the American national championsips in Indianapolis in three weeks in a bid to better the qualifying time. "Syliva is better over 100 m than 200 m so her time last week-end showed she was in good shape for the American nationals. Because the Americans are using the meeting as

national trials she will have to swim the time [in thte heats because non-Americans are not allowed in the finals,” Mrs Williams said. Coaches and officials are expecting a team of eight to 10 swimmers for Seoul, but only two swimmers — Paul Kingsman (Auckland) and Sharon Musson (Hawkes Bay) — have bettered qualifying standards to date. ! 1 . Kingsman was a double silver medallist in backstroke events at the Edinburgh Games, and Mussoh, who achieved the qualifying standard for Edinburgh, was excluded from the final team by the new Zealand Olympic and Commonwealth Games selectors. Musson has backed up her qualifying times, done at the Pan Pacific Games, j with a New Zealand J short-course 200 m backstroke record last week-end in Napier. Her time of 2min 16.06 s took 0.7 s off the previous record, set by Hume. | Her coach, Bert Cotterill, said yesterday he hoped his pupil would swim under the qualifying fime [again at the New Zealand championships which start in; Dunedin on March 16. "We are still aware of what happened . with the Commonwealth Games ! so we want to better the times again at the nationals ,to make sure Sharon is included! in the team this time,” Mr’Cotterill

said. ! Other members of the Edinburgh 1 commonwealth Games team ; still seeking qualifying times are Ross Anderson, Grant Forbes, Brent Foster. Richard Lockhart, Kirk Torrance, Fiona McLay and Kerry Torrance. McLay and Anderson look to be the only swimmers of that group capable of reaching the stringent target times, but two young ! Christchurch women, Anna : Simcic and Linda Robinson; are tantalisingly close to qualifying times, and (will be attempting to better them nt the national championships, i