(BEIJING, August 10) -- Like Day 2, 4 golds will come out of the water on Monday morning. Golds in Women's 100m Butterfly, 400m Freestyle, Men's 100m Breaststroke and 4x100m Freestyle relay will be awarded at the Water Cube Monday. Also four semi-finals will be underway in the morning session: Women's 100m Backstroke, 100m Breaststroke, Men's 200m Freestyle and 100m Backstroke. The evening session includes three prelims.
After waves of record-breaking today, fans are enthusiastic about tomorrow's finals. Olympics record-breaker Federica Pellegrini of Italy will be in lane 4 in tomorrow's Women's 400m Freestyle final with her strong rival Katie Hoff next to her in lane 3. Alexander Dale Oen of Norway will be competing in lane 4 in the Men's 100m Breaststroke final with the Athens gold medalist Kitajima Kosuke beside him in lane 5 and the world record holder Brendan Hansen in lane 2.
As for the Men's 4x100m Freestyle Relay, the world-record breaking US team will be in the central lane flanked by the Frenchmen and the Aussies. The competition will be fierce and the chance for another world record is good. As for Women's 100m Butterfly, expectations for the top-level swimmer Lisbeth Trickett of Australia, her fellow Australian Jessicah Schipper, and 22-year-old Christine Magnuson of the United States run high.
As for the semifinals, Michael Phelps will attract lots of attention in the Men's 200m Freestyle semifinal as he continues his historic quest for 8 golds. If he manages to set a world record in this event, it will be his 24th career world record in an individual Olympic event, which marks an all-time record. Park Tae-hwan, the Men's 400m Freestyle gold medalist of Republic of Korea will be in the same heat with him in lane 3. Lane 4 belongs to the top qualifier of today's prelim, Jean Basson of South Africa.
Olympic-record breaker Kirsty Coventry of Zimbabwe will race with Laure Manaudou of France in heat 2, while Natalie Coughlin of United States will be in heat 1 of the Women's 100m Backstroke semifinal. Another Olympic-record breaker Leisel Jones of Australia will be in the same heat with her teammate Megan Jendrick, and Rebecca Soni (USA) will swim in the other heat of the Women's100m Breaststroke semifinal. The last Olympic-record breaker of today, Matt Grevers (USA) in Men's 100m backstroke will face his fellow teammate and world-record holder Aaron Peirsol.
"Pre-taste" for the three prelims:
Michael Phelps will defend his Olympic title in the Men's 200m Butterfly on Wednesday at the National Aquatics Center. Few would bet against Phelps winning this event as he has already smashed his 400m Individual Medley world record in winning gold. Phelps is the Athens gold medalist and also the world record holder in this event. His closest competitor is Gil Stovall (USA) who has the second fastest time of 2008 but is well off Phelps' pace. Pawel Korzeniowski of Poland, Matsuda Takeshi of Japan, and Wu Peng of China are also medal hopefuls.
In the Women's 200m Individual Medley, Stephanie Rice of Australia who just won the gold medal in the 400m Individual Medley today is favored to win but will be challenged by Katie Hoff of United States. Hoff's finishing with a Bronze medal in the 400m IM and losing her world records to Rice in the process should motivate her. Also, Kirsty Coventry of Zimbabwe should not be discounted. She is the Olympic Bronze medalist from the Athens 2004 Olympic Games, the Silver medalist from last year's world championships and has recorded the fourth fastest time in the event this year.
Katie Hoff will also enter the Women's 200m Freestyle on Monday as the favorite in the absence of world-record holder Laure Manadou of France. After a disappointing showing in the Women's 400m Individual Medley final, the American will face stiff competition from Sara Isakovic of Slovakia and her US teammate Alison Schmitt. Hoff holds the fastest time in the event in 2008 and Isakovic the second-fastest. Schmitt has the third-fastest time this year, and was just four hundredths of a second behind Hoff at the US Olympic Team trials in July.
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