Malawian swimmers flop at World Championship

Three Malawian swimmers Filipe Gomes, Ammara Pinto and Michael Swift failed to reach the semi-finals at the World Championship underway in Gwangju, South Korea.

But the three swimmers have a chance to make up for their failure as they will race in other events later this week.

Malawi team coach Yona Walesi said Gomes finished third in his heat, maintaining his best time of 1:07.51 in the 100 metres (m) breaststroke.

However, his 77/87 ranking meant his performance was not good enough for the Portugal-based swimmer to make the semi-final cut, the coach said.

United States-based Swift finished ninth in the 50m butterfly in his  heat and ranked  85/94 overall.

Walesi said he failed to beat his career best time by a second, having wrapped up the distance in 29.60.

Racing on Sunday night, Thailand-based Pinto competed in the 100m backstroke. She improved her best time with four seconds.

“Her final time was 1:16.06. She was 8/10 in her heat and 61/63 in the whole event. Her time improvement was not enough to book her a semi-final place,” Walesi said.

In the meantime, the fourth Malawian representative Tayamika Chang’anamuno will compete in the 50m backstroke tomorrow.

Gomes will return to the pool on Friday when he will race in the 50m freestyle,  Michael will compete in 100m freestyle tomorrow while Pinto will swim in 50m freestyle this Saturday.