{"id":12897,"date":"2012-07-29T01:43:39","date_gmt":"2012-07-28T23:43:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/07\/olympics-swimming-kitajima-on-course-to-three-peat\/"},"modified":"2012-07-29T01:43:39","modified_gmt":"2012-07-28T23:43:39","slug":"olympics-swimming-kitajima-on-course-to-three-peat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/olympics-swimming-kitajima-on-course-to-three-peat\/","title":{"rendered":"Olympics-Swimming-Kitajima on course to three-peat"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"articleLocation\">LONDON, July 28<\/span> (Reuters) &#8211; Japan&#8217;s Kosuke Kitajima flirted<br \/>\nwith disappointment but stayed on course for the chance to<br \/>\nbecome the first male swimmer to win the same event at three<br \/>\nOlympics when he booked his place on Saturday in the final of<br \/>\nthe 100 metres breaststroke.<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Kitajima, who won the breaststroke double at Athens in 2004<br \/>\nand Beijing four years later, qualified sixth fastest overall<br \/>\nwhen he finished fourth in his semi-final in a time of 59.69<br \/>\nseconds.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>South Africa&#8217;s Cameron van der Burgh set the fastest time of<br \/>\n58.83, just ahead of Italy&#8217;s Fabio Scozzoli and Australia&#8217;s<br \/>\nBrenton Rickard.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The 29-year-old Kitajima was aided by the slower pace in the<br \/>\nsecond semi-final, with only the top two finishers in that race<br \/>\nswimming fast enough to make the final.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Kitajima and Michael Phelps are locked in a race to become<br \/>\nthe first man to complete a three-peat but with Phelps failing<br \/>\nto get on the podium in Saturday&#8217;s 400 individual medley final,<br \/>\nKitajima has the chance to do it in Sunday&#8217;s breaststroke final.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The event, however, was tinged with sadness because of the<br \/>\ndeath of world champion Alexander Dale Oen in April.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Norway&#8217;s Dale Oen, who won the world title in Shanghai last<br \/>\nyear three days after a bombing and shooting attack in Oslo that<br \/>\nkilled 77 people, had been at a training camp in Arizona when he<br \/>\ncollapsed and died.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>A medical examiner ruled the 26-year-old had died of severe<br \/>\ncoronary artery disease and his compatriot Sara Nordenstam said<br \/>\nhis absence was felt in their team and at the pool.<\/p>\n<p> (Reporting by Julian Linden; Editing by Greg Stutchbury)<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"copyright\">\n<p>         \t\t\u00a9 Thomson Reuters 2012 All rights reserved<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>LONDON, July 28 (Reuters) &#8211; Japan&#8217;s Kosuke Kitajima flirted with disappointment but stayed on course for the chance to become the first male swimmer to win the same event at three Olympics when he booked his place on Saturday in the final of the 100 metres breaststroke. Kitajima, who won the breaststroke double at Athens [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-12897","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12897"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12897\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}