Sammy Kitula
9 July 2009
Nairobi — Kenya's Olympic swimming hero Jason Dunford has bagged the country's first ever medal in the 50-year-old World University Games held in Belgrade, Serbia.
The national swimming torpedo clocked 23.09 seconds to win silver in the 50 metres butterfly and also qualified for the 100m freestyle final on Wednesday night after being placed third. The event's final was scheduled for Thursday night.
Jason clocked a new Kenya record time of 48.84, breaking his own mark (49.09) set at the Beijing Olympics. He was eyeing the 50m butterfly gold but that slipped away at the start as he brought the rear at eighth place at the halfway mark.
But he managed to pull up to second, missing first place by a mere four hundredths of a second (0.04 seconds), behind the winner Jernej Godec of Slovenia who was timed at 23.41.
Despite Jason's disappointing slip, he still holds the championship's 23.09-second record, which he set in the semis.
His younger brother David improved his personal best time to 50.11 from 50.79, which placed him 17th. This had him miss out on the 100m freestyle semis by a whisker as only 16 swimmers go through.
Jason was the sixth fastest into the semis with a time of 49.43."These brothers are doing Kenya proud. There can't be better preparations for the World Championships (in Rome this month-end) than these events being held in Serbia," said Kenya Swimming Federation's publicity officer, Winnie Kamau.
Favourite eventWednesday morning, Jason swam the heats of the 100m butterfly and qualified second into the semi in 52.22.
"The 100m butterfly is his favourite event and he has high hopes of winning it despite the extremely stiff competition. Tonight (Thursday night) he has a very tough schedule, with the semis of 100m fly followed 20 minutes later by the final of 100m free," said the duo's father, Martin Dunford. "This event is a perfect warm-up for the boys as preparation for the World Championships."
Jason was yet to tackle the 100m freestyle final and 100m butterfly semis, as well as 50m freestyle heats and 100m butterfly finals today(Friday), added the senior Dunford.
He said David will also swim 50m freestyle heats today and hopes to progress to the semis in the evening.
Jason still has the 100m butterfly later in the week where he is aiming for gold.
The brothers will be joined by Achieng' Ajulu-Bushell, Rachita Shah, Sylvia Brunlehner and Pina Ercolano for the upcoming annual championship in Italy."Last year's Olympics were a launching pad for greater things," added Kamau.
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