16 Apr 2015

NZ swimmers qualify for World Champs

6:41 am on 16 April 2015

Ten New Zealand swimmers have now qualified for this year's World Championships after two nights of the New Zealand National Championships in Auckland.

New Zealand's Lauren Boyle wins Gold in the Women's 400m Freestyle Final, Glasgow Commonwealth Games, 2014.

New Zealand's Lauren Boyle wins Gold in the Women's 400m Freestyle Final, Glasgow Commonwealth Games, 2014. Photo: PHOTOSPORT

Tauranga's Nathan Capp and 15-year-old Bobbi Gichard added their names to the list of six swimmers who qualified for the worlds on Tuesday's opening night and Kane Radford and Charlotte Webby, who have already secured their places in the 10km open water swim in Kazan, Russia in August.

Added to this were FINA A times set by Lauren Boyle and Glenn Snyders in the 1500m freestyle and 50m breaststroke respectively, after both qualified for the world championships on the opening night.

Capp, 22, provided the early highlight on the second night of finals when he not only qualified for the world championships, but broke the long-standing New Zealand record in the 400m individual medley at the West Wave Aquatic Centre in Henderson.

Capp was not confident of his chances in this event, after suffering a shoulder and hip injury this summer, and focussing on his chances in the 1500m freestyle where he is the national record holder in both long course and short course.

"I felt good tonight. I needed to pace myself because Bradlee (Ashby) is probably the best fly swimmer over 100m in the country right now," Capp said.

"To qualifying is great but to break Dean's record is really special. I have held him in such high esteem all of my career so to have his record is incredible."

Capp came back later in the meet to win the 800m freestyle in 7:58.30, nearly five seconds inside the previous New Zealand record set by Dylan Dunlop-Barrett.

Rising star Gichard became the eighth swimmer this week to qualify in the pool when she took out the women's 100m backstroke.

Gichard, the Youth Olympic medallist, was locked in a battle with fellow 15-year-old rising star Gabrielle Fa'amausili in the 100m backstroke final, with both chasing qualification to their first open world championships.

The Para-Swimmers, chasing qualification for the IPC Swimming World Championships in Glasgow in July, added two further qualifying swims.

Sophie Pascoe, who broke the 100m butterfly world record on Tuesday, was timed at 1:07.30 in the 100m backstroke S10 which was five seconds inside the qualifying mark while North Shore's Rebecca Dubber was three seconds under her qualifying time for the S7 category in the same event.

Pascoe has now qualified for three events and Dubber two with six Para-Swimmers qualifying in 10 events so far.

Glen Snyders dominated the 50m breaststroke, winning in 27.50s, the 11th fastest time in the world this year, after qualifying in the 100m breaststroke on the opening night.

The National Championships conclude on Friday.