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Coster, Ingram star, Herring grabs record at Olympic Trials

Friday 28 March 2008, 9:37PM

By Swimming New Zealand

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WAITAKERE CITY

The North Shore backstroke pair Liz Coster and Melissa Ingram cemented their Beijing claims with another qualifying performance in finals on the third day of the Absolute Insurance Olympic Trials at Waitakere City.

Coster edged her team-mate Ingram to claim the 100m backstroke title and both again went under the Olympic qualifying mark to repeat their efforts from the heats last night. This brings the total to four swimmers who have met the FINA A standard.

West Auckland sprinter Mark Herring also signalled his intentions in breaking the New Zealand 100m freestyle record as the lead off swimmer in the freestyle relay today.

His time of 49.54s was nearly 4/10ths of a second off the previous mark set by Cameron Gibson at last year’s world championships. While it was still 3/10ths off the qualifying mark for Beijing, it sets up a real battle for the upcoming 100m freestyle final and the spot in the relays.

Coster was delighted to win the 100m backstroke title and go under the Beijing mark but was disappointed with her swim, as she chased a time close to the magical one minute barrier.

“I did not quite put it together as I wanted because I was chasing an even faster time today,” Coster said. “I was quite excited after the swim last night and had some trouble swimming.

“But I got the job done. I did what I needed to do to qualify and now I can concentrate on the hard work ahead to improve even further for Beijing.”

Coster said she had no problems with her new racing suit after the zip broke before last night’s heat.

“Look the new suits are great and feel fantastic. But in the end it comes down to the swimmers and I have worked so hard over the last 15 years to get to this point and that should not be forgotten,” Coster said.

She clocked 1:01.43 with Ingram 2/10ths of a second behind but pleased with her swim.

“My main aim is the 200m backstroke so I was really pleased with that swim. It felt great and I’m looking forward to that event after this swim,” Ingram said.

Helen Norfolk won the 400m freestyle from West Auckland’s Lauren Boyle in 4:13.50, which pleased the 26 year old North Shore swimmer.

“I am continuing to work hard on my freestyle and hopefully it will have a good effect on my medley time tonight,” Norfolk said.

Young West Auckland swimmer Daniel Bell impressed to win the 100m backstroke title in a battle against Kurt Bassett (Laser Mt Eden) and John Zulch (North Shore) winning in 55.63, a new age group national record. It sets Bell up with the inside running for the backstroke place in the medley relay team, if it qualifies for Beijing.

In other swims Michael Jack (West Auckland Aquatics) won the 200m freestyle in 1:52.93, Glenn Snyders (North Shore) took out the 50m breaststroke and Christchurch’s Amaka Gessler (Aquagym) won the 50m butterfly.

Tonight’s session of heats features Moss Burmester in the 200m butterfly, Helen Norfolk in the 200m individual medley, new national record holder Herring against Gibson and Orinoco Faamausili-Banse in the 100m freestyle and Snyders in the 200m breaststroke.