burnett the man to beat in sheffield

Simon Burnett blasted his third British record of the meet as he erased the 50m freestyle mark and booked his second event for the Commonwealth Games. Chris Cook also continued the good form he had shown in Montreal to win the 100m breaststroke and confirm his place for Melbourne.
Having missed the World Championships, Burnett’s main focus of this summer has been these trials and it has shown in the level of his performances. the Arizona based swimmer knocked a full second off his 50m best over the course of the rounds and posted 22.12 in the final as he clipped 0.01 off Mark Foster’s 2001 standard. Foster finished in the runner up spot in 22.43, his fastest swim since his silver medal winning performance in Barcelona in 2003 and under the C selection time.
Cook, meanwhile, again proved that he is the number one male breaststroker in Britain at the current time as he took out the 100m event in 1::00.70, just outside the best he set in Montreal. For the first two thirds of the race James Gibson had been leading, but Cook produced a huge finishing burst to claim the title. Gibson held off Darren Mew to take silver in 1:01.43, while Mew posted 1:02.03, still a way off his best form.
Another British record fell in the women’s 400m IM, where Becky Cooker put all of her freestyle woes behind her to drop her own mark by over a second. her time of 4:45.52 was under the C qualification standard.
There was no such joy for Kate Haywood who missed the A qualification standard in the 50m breaststroke by just 0.12, while Katy Sexton could only manage 2:12.28 in the 200m Backstroke. There was welcome return to somewhere approaching top form for Jo Fargus in second however as the 2003 Commonwealth Silver medallist posted 2:12.56. Mel Marshall was again slightly off the pace in the 200m freestyle and will now look to qualify in December as she posted 1:59.86 for the win., Marshall summed up what many followers of swimming have felt about this season when she said afterwards “I feel like I’ve been chasing times all year and now I’m going to have to do it again in December.”
Elsewhere there were wins for Matt Bowe in the 200m butterfly and Gregor Tait in the 200m backstroke, while Terri Dunning took her second title of the meet in the 100m butterfly, just outside the C qualification time.