By Clara Ferreira-Marques
LONDON, July 29 (Reuters) – South African Cameron Van der
Burgh, struggling to contain his emotions, shook his finger in
disbelief at the screen above the pool as it flashed his 100
metres breaststroke world record and his country’s first gold of
the 2012 Olympic Games.
The 24-year-old Van der Burgh became the first South African
man to win Olympic gold in an individual swimming event, after
he powered through a race that left champion Kosuke Kitajima and
previous record holder Brenton Rickard trailing in his wake.
He set a world record of 58.46 seconds on Sunday, beating
the 58.58 set by Brenton Rickard in 2009. It also eclipsed the
Olympic record of 58.83 he set in his semi-final on Saturday.
“Tonight, as I came in, I said to myself, ‘a man can change
his stars, you can write your own destiny tonight’. I had my
chance and I took it,” he said, after a victory that saw him lie
back in the pool in sheer exhilaration at the finish.
Van der Burgh later said he was looking up at the sky –
remembering Norwegian rival and world champion Alexander Dale
Oen, who died earlier this year of a heart attack.
“I know that he was probably laughing down at me, thinking
‘how can you go that time?'”
Van der Burgh’s victory ends a medal drought for South
African swimming, after the team failed to win a single medal at
the Beijing Games in 2008, a disappointment after Athens when an
“awesome foursome” won gold in the 4×100 freestyle relay,
followed by an individual silver and bronze from Roland
Schoeman.
Continued…
