2018 COMMONWEALTH GAMES
- Thursday, April 5th – Tuesday, April 10th (swimming)
- Optus Aquatic Centre, Gold Coast, Australia
- Prelims at 10:30am local (8:30pm previous night EDT)
- Finals at 7:30pm local (5:30am EDT)
- Official Commonwealth Games website
- Entries
- Meet Schedule + Results
- Live Stream (Canada)
- Live Stream (US)
- Live Stream (Australia)
In one of the most thrilling races of tonight’s final session in Gold Coast, Australia, Cameron van der Burgh of South Africa denied Englishman Adam Peaty his 2nd gold medal of these Commonwealth Games Championships.
Having already captured gold in the 100m breaststroke in a Games Record-setting time, Peaty completed a 4-year winning streak in that event and appeared primed to race away with the 50m sprint gold as well. But, 29-year-old Van der Burgh had other plans, as the 2012 Olympic champion crushed a winning time of 26.58 to hold off Peaty by just .04 of a second. Rapidly improving James Wilby of England took the bronze in 27.37.
“It was a great race. Credit to Van der Burgh,” Peaty told BBC Sport after the race. “I’ve been off my best all week. Even though it’s a silver, I’m more happy with that silver than I was the gold the other day.
“It gives me a reality check. Even if you are the best in the world, world record holder, you can still be beaten. I think that’s the most valuable lesson from today.
“In April I’m never this fast so I’ll take it as a positive and move on to the Europeans.”
The pair are used to battling it out all the way to the wall, as this same result transpired at the 2014 edition of the Commonwealth Games. In that year, VDB took the gold in a then-Games Record-setting time of 26.78, with Peaty touching just .02 behind in 26.76. In that race, too, both men were the only competitors to dip under the 27-second threshold.
Despite holding the World Record in this 50m breaststroke with the 25.95 he threw down for gold in Budapest at last year’s World Championships, Peaty has proven before that he is indeed mortal in this event. At last year’s European Short Course Championships, Peaty was beaten down to a 3rd place finish.
Having watched this live in the stands, it looks like Peaty has been playing with his dive. It was absolute garbage and was over a half body length behind at the break out. He did an insane job in working his way back to get as close as he did but had his dive not been a complete flop in comparison he may have gotten the job done. Props to Cameron for keeping the South African gold train chugging along! Great atmosphere in the stands
Nice sprint from CVDB . Great night for Saffas .
Cate Campbell got beaten, Sjostrom got beaten, Ledecky got beaten, Peaty got beaten. Who is next from the dominant stars? Hosszu?
And all good for the sport. I actually get a bit tired of any one swimmers dominance, whether its Peaty, Hoszu, Ledecky or Phelps.
Its good he lost. Couldn’t hear the excuses anymore
I remembered he keeps mentioning about Project 56. Means he wants to aim for a sub 57 in 100 breast. I am not sure if he could do it this year. To me, going sub 57 in breast stroke is very difficult. Maybe he could achieve it in Tokyo Olympics.
It’s insanely difficult. He’s the only one with even a remote hope of doing it right now (until someone else eventually breaks through in LCM). He’s talking about going 56.99 when few of his competitors can even go sub 59.00. That would be like Dressel going 45.99 100free when everyone else is 47.high or 48.99 100fly when everyone else is 50.high (as far as margin of victory over competitors goes – just to show how ridiculously fast those times are).
That 48.99 doesn’t seem impossible tbh
Wonder why he talked about targeting world records at Commonwealth tho if he wasn’t planning on being in top shape.
Adam Peaty targeting world records:
https://www.gc2018.com/article/adam-peaty-looking-do-impossible-gc2018-pool
https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/sport/commonwealth-games/i-will-strive-to-hit-new-heights-at-commonwealth-games-peaty-36750694.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZEHYfLfuEM
Marketing.
Defeat always comes around the corner – even to the best of the best . Phelps knows very well how that feels and how much one
can learn from them : Humility , reality check , we are not robots but human , etc…..
Van Der Burgh wins and the only quotes are from Peaty? What did the winner have to say?
Exactly what I said! Crazy stuff