Commonwealth Games 2018: world records broken in pursuit of gold

A revitalised Cate Campbell led the Australian women’s 4x100m freestyle relay team to a world record and gold medal last night.

Australia’s 4x100m freestyle relay team — from left, Shayna Jack, Cate Campbell, Emma McKeon, Bronte Campbell — celebrates its victory last night. Picture: Getty Images

If the Gold Coast Aquatic Centre had had a roof, it would have lifted off, such was the noise as a revitalised Cate Campbell led the Australian women’s 4x100m freestyle relay team to a world record and gold medal in the final event of the opening night in the pool.

The victory capped a successful night for Australia that delivered five gold medals and two world records.

The men’s cycling pursuit team claimed bragging rights from arch-rivals England with a world-record ride to win gold, minutes after the women’s pursuit team had also claimed gold. Sam Welsford, Leigh Howard, Alex Porter and Kelland O’Brien roared to victory, shaving nearly a second off the world record.

Australia won its third gold medal at the Anna Meares Velodrome when duo Stephanie Morton and Kaarle McCulloch beat New Zealand to win the women’s team sprint.

Freestyle swimmer Mack Horton kicked off the opening night gold rush, with the Olympic ­champion in Rio two years ago breaking a 16-year Australian drought in the 400m at the Commonwealth Games.

Just as Horton changed the mood so dramatically in Brazil with his epic and unexpected ­triumph in the 400m freestyle, so he confirmed his ­status as the world’s premier ­middle-distance swimmer by coming from third at the halfway mark to claw back the lead from England’s James Guy and claim the gold.
Horton led countryman Jack McLoughlin home for a 1-2 finish.

But the performance of the night belonged to the women’s 4x100m relay team.

Former world record-holder Campbell, in her return to the Australian team after a year’s break to recover from her individual disappointment in Rio, produced the fastest relay split of all-time, an astonishing 51sec flat, to seal the world record of 3min30.05sec.

Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom currently holds the world record at 51.71sec. Even allowing half a second for a flying relay start, Campbell proved last night that she was capable of taking the world record back as early as this week.

From left, Kelland O’Brien, Alex Porter, Sam Welsford and Leigh Howard celebrate their gold-medal cycling win. Picture: AAP

In Rio she was weighed down by the pressure of the occasion as the favourite for the 100m ­freestyle gold medal and described her performance as “possibly the greatest choke in Olympic history’’. But after a year getting her life in perspective, she has found a lightness of being that has reignited her swimming career.

Campbell said the home crowd lifted her up and set her free last night.

“There’s been all this talk about, is there going to be pressure, but no, we’re just feeling the love, we’re feeling the support,’’ she said.

“That’s what happens when you feel it, world records.’’

This relay team is making a good case for being proclaimed the best team in the country after breaking the world record for the third successive Games. Its time at the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games was the fastest in the world and it bettered that at the Rio Olympics in 2016.

Cate and Bronte Campbell and Emma McKeon have been the common thread through that golden run but last night they were joined by the Campbell sisters’ teenaged training partner Shayna Jack, who fought her way into the relay via a time trial yesterday morning. Jack was given the honour of leading off the team last night and set a personal best of 54.03sec.

At the velodrome, Australia’s men, the fastest qualifiers for the team pursuit final, gradually overpowered their English rivals. They powered home in 3min 49.804sec to shatter the 3:50.265 world ­record Britain set at the Rio Olympics two years ago.

Welsford said the team had had its eye on the gold medal “for such a long time” and to come home under 3:50 was “unreal”.

“When I looked at the board, I had to have a second glance — 3:49 — then it was pure happiness. I just screamed and let out all the emotion … I never knew how fast we were going.”

Porter said later he was ecstatic with the win and breaking the world record but expected it to take a while to sink in.

He said he grew a mullet for the occasion under a deal with his brother. “What’s more Australian than a mullet?”

In the women’s team final, Ashlee Ankudinoff, Annette ­Edmondson, Amy Cure and ­Alexandra Manly had nearly lapped New Zealand on the lightning fast track in front of a sold-out crowd of 4000 spectators.

“It was amazing. So good to win,” ­Ankudinoff said before the women’s medal was presented by the Duchess of Cornwall. ​