Zimbabwe's Coventry defends title in backstroke

by Marcel Pellerin | August 16, 2008 at 10:09 am

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Coventry successfuly defended her title at the 2008 Olympics. I managed to catch this on CBC's olympic coverage last night on the only channel i have. this woman's face was so composed the entire time i was completely impressed.

With the wider world waiting for Michael Phelps to dive in and go for his seventh gold medal, a small block of fans wearing "Team Coventry" T-shirts had another priority in the Water Cube on Saturday.

They wanted one gold medal in Beijing from Zimbabwe's expatriate hero, Kirsty Coventry. She already had finished second on three occasions in this fast pool, but she was the favorite in the 200-meter backstroke, and she did not let herself or her troubled nation down.

Although the American Margaret Hoelzer surfaced first after the start, Coventry, with her slightly faster stroke rate, took the lead by the end of the first lap and never surrendered it.

She successfully defended her Olympic title in a world record time of 2 minutes 5.24 seconds, the 22nd swimming world record at these Olympics.