By John Lohn
OMAHA, Nebraska, June 29. THE hunter looks like he's going to shoot down himself. An avid outdoorsman, Brendan Hansen made a run at his world record in the 100 breaststroke during the second semifinal Sunday. Ultimately, he came up just short. No biggie. The final is tomorrow and a 58-point effort appears to be on the horizon.
The world-record holder in 59.13, Hansen clocked the second-fastest time in history, a 59.24 performance wowing the crowd at the Qwest Center. Hansen went out in 27.75 and blazed through the last lap en route to his 14th sub-minute outing of his career. Hansen is the only American to break a minute and owns the four-fastest times in history and five of the quickest six.
"I made a little, tiny mistake tonight," Hansen said. "I came off the wall, as I was doing my pullout, and I could hear the announcer, Sam, say that I was under world-record pace. I kind of got too excited, and the first couple of strokes I really didn't get back into my rhythm. A small mistake like that tomorrow night, I obviously won't do. I wasn't expecting to be out that fast, but this this place and this crowd the way it is, the only way I was going to get noticed tonight was if I broke a world record."
The second spot for the final went to Athens Olympian Mark Gangloff, who clocked 1:00.17, a little slower than his morning effort of 1:00.10. Yep, Hansen has created nearly a second gap over his fellow American competitors, a ridiculous margin for a 100-meter race. Taking the third spot for the title heat was Eric Shanteau in 1:00.63.
Scott Spann, from Longhorn Aquatics like Hansen, was fourth in 1:00.94 and was followed in the next two positions by Chris Ash (1:01.16) and Scott Usher (1:01.18). Closing out the field for the final were Kevin Swander (1:01.27) and John Criste (1:01.38).
Video Footage Removed Due to NBC Restrictions
Go to Swimming World's 2008 Olympics Landing Page for the most comprehensive coverage of the meet on the Internet.
