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ROME, Italy, July 30. KOSUKE Kitajima's meet record of 2:09.42 did not stand a chance this morning in the men's 200 breast at the FINA World Championships. The top 10 swimmers all beat the previous mark with Eric Shanteau of the U.S. turning in a 2:08.55 for the top seed.
Hungary's Daniel Gyurta (2:08.71) and Italy's Loris Facci (2:08.85) each broke 2:09 to finish among the top three. Facci lowered Paolo Bossini's Italian record of 2:08.98 set last year.
Germany's Marco Koch (2:09.06), Brazil's Henrique Barbosa (2:09.22), Kazakhstan's Yevgeniy Ryzhkov (2:09.26), Lithuania's Giedruis Titenis (2:09.28), Italy's Edoardo Giorgetti (2:09.29), Great Britain's Kris Gilchrist (2:09.31) and Japan's Yuta Suenaga (2:09.33) all cleared Kitajima's meet record.
Titenis eclipsed his national mark of 2:10.83 set earlier this month, while Gilchrist downed his 2:10.27 set in 2008.
France's Hugues Duboscq (2:09.45), Australia's Christian Sprenger (2:09.82), South Africa's Neil Versfeld (2:09.86), Russia's Grigory Falko (2:10.23), Ukraine's Igor Borysik (2:10.39) and Australia's Brenton Rickard (2:10.54) also earned spots in semis.
Versfeld broke 2:10 for the first time, lowering his national mark of 2:10.06 from last summer.