By Stephen J. Thomas
ATHENS, Greece August 15. JAPAN’S Tomomi Morita came within 0.01 of a second of his national record in the 100 meter backstroke to qualify first for this evening's semifinals round.
Morita, who SwimInfo correspondent Hideki Mochizuki predicted would be a surprise factor in the dorsal events, clocked 54.41, beating both Aaron Peirsol (54.65) and world record-holder Lenny Krayzelburg (54.87) in the final heat. Krayzelburg is the defending Olympic champion.
Hungarian Laszlo Cseh, bronze medalist in the 400IM, was third man through in 54.80, ahead of Austria’s (and Stanford's) Markus Rogan (54.87), German Steffan Driesen (54.87) and Russian hope Arkady Vyatchanin (55.17).
Malaysian Alex Lim, who swims for the University of California, also qualified with a 55.22, as did Aussie Matt Welsh, the 2000 silver medalist, who was ninth in 55.35.
It took a 55.80 to make it into tonight's second round.
Men 100m Backstroke Heats
Record Split Name NOC Location Date
WR 53.60 25.97
KRAYZELBURG Lenny USA Sydney (AUS) 24 AUG 1999
OR 53.72 25.99
KRAYZELBURG Lenny USA Sydney (AUS) 18 SEP 2000
Event No: 10
Rank Heat Lane Name NOC R.T. 50m Time Time
Behind
1 6 3 MORITA Tomomi JPN 0.56 26.73 54.41
27.68
2 6 4 PEIRSOL Aaron USA 0.70 26.43 54.65
28.22 0.24
3 4 6 CSEH Laszlo HUN 0.66 26.76 54.80
28.04 0.39
4 5 3 ROGAN Markus AUT 0.75 26.89 54.87
27.98 0.46
4 6 5 KRAYZELBURG Lenny USA 0.67 26.82 54.87
28.05 0.46
6 5 5 DRIESEN Steffen GER 0.69 26.85 54.92
28.07 0.51
7 4 4 VYATCHANIN Arkady RUS 0.88 27.02 55.17
28.15 0.76
8 6 6 ALEX LIM Keng Liat MAS 0.63 26.54 55.22
28.68 0.81
9 5 4 WELSH Matt AUS 0.69 27.23 55.35
28.12 0.94
10 4 5 OUYANG Kunpeng CHN 0.56 26.65 55.50
28.85 1.09
11 4 3 di CARLI Marco GER 0.59 26.76 55.58
28.82 1.17
12 5 1 ZANDBERG Gerhard RSA 0.75 26.87 55.62
28.75 1.21
13 6 7 DUFOUR Simon FRA 0.71 27.68 55.76
28.08 1.35
14 5 6 TAIT Gregor GBR 0.69 27.07 55.77
28.70 1.36
14 6 1 FLOREA Razvan ROM 0.66 27.10 55.77
28.67 1.36
16 3 5 KOZULJ Gordan CRO 0.75 27.17 55.80
28.63 1.39
17 3 2 GRIGORIADIS Aristeidis GRE 0.72 27.22 55.85
28.63 1.44
17 5 2 WATSON Josh AUS 0.68 27.04 55.85
28.81 1.44
19 4 2 ALESHIN Evgeny RUS 0.71 27.17 55.91
28.74 1.50
20 3 6 PINI Ryan PNG 0.74 26.93 55.97
29.04 1.56
21 5 8 ROGER Pierre FRA 0.70 26.60 56.07
29.47 1.66
22 4 7 GIBSON Cameron NZL 0.80 27.37 56.14
28.77 1.73
23 4 1 MANIA Adam POL 0.55 27.14 56.20
29.06 1.79
24 3 3 GRIGALIONIS Darius LTU 0.60 27.49 56.21
28.72 1.80
25 2 5 NECKLES Nicholas BAR 0.60 27.30 56.32
29.02 1.91
26 3 7 BUYUKUNCU Derya TUR 0.57 27.38 56.34
28.96 1.93
27 2 6 KRIZKO Lubos SVK 0.60 27.00 56.62
29.62 2.21
27 4 8 NIKOLAYCHUK Volodymyr UKR 0.70 27.80 56.62
28.82 2.21
27 5 7 ROSE Matt CAN 0.58 27.09 56.62
29.53 2.21
30 2 4 SUNG Min KOR 0.54 27.32 56.78
29.46 2.37
31 3 4 HUSSEIN Ahmed EGY 0.60 27.49 56.86
29.37 2.45
32 3 1 MACHADO Paulo BRA 0.66 27.68 57.07
29.39 2.66
33 3 8 OTERO Eduardo German ARG 0.68 27.41 57.28
29.87 2.87
34 6 8 HORVATH Peter HUN 0.67 28.05 57.29
29.24 2.88
35 6 2 WILDEBOER Aschwin ESP 0.64 27.15 57.35
30.20 2.94
36 2 2 MAKI Matti FIN 0.75 27.91 57.57
29.66 3.16
37 2 3 GLEASON George ISV 0.80 27.82 57.64
29.82 3.23
38 1 3 VYTHOULKAS Christopher BAH 0.69 28.43 58.31
29.88 3.90
39 2 1 ASHBY Brendan ZIM 0.66 28.31 58.91
30.60 4.50
40 2 7 BERETIC Igor SCG 0.72 28.49 59.38
30.89 4.97
41 1 4 OSSINKSKIY Stanislav KAZ 0.77 29.06 59.92
30.86 5.51
42 1 5 IVLEV Alexandr MDA 0.57 29.30 1:00.13
30.83 5.72
43 2 8 BUGAKOV Danil UZB 0.65 29.45 1:02.28
32.83 7.87
44 1 6 ABU FARES Omar JOR 0.62 29.94 1:02.36
32.42 7.95
1 2 DEFREITAS Donnie VIN DNS