New Zealand swimmer Melissa Ingram won gold on the opening night of finals at the World Cup meet in Beijing, breaking her own national record in the process.
The 26-year-old yesterday took out the women's 200m backstroke in an exciting final, holding off China's Yanxin Zhou by just 1/100th ofa second after the hometown swimmer was roared on by a local crowd.
Ingram, coached by Scott Talbot, topped qualifiers comfortably and took nearly a one second lead at the halfway mark in the final. The Chinese swimmer closed to 0.3s at the 150m mark but the New Zealander showed her experience to hold on for the victory by the narrowest of margins.
Her winning time of 2min 3s took virtually a second off her previous New Zealand record set at the World Cup in Singapore last year, achieved off the back of her peak form at the Commonwealth Games in Delhi.
Earlier, Ingram qualified seventh fastest in the heats of the 200m freestyle but withdrew from that final to concentrate on the 200m backstroke final.
Young Auckland swimmer Jessica Marston finished seventh in the final of the women's 800m freestyle. The teenager clocked 8:47.66, nearly one second faster than her effort in finishing fourth at the previous World Cup in Singapore at the weekend.
Meanwhile, five-time Olympic gold medallist Ian Thorpe failed for a second day to reach a final, adding to his comeback woes.
The Australian finished the 100m butterfly in 54.35s yesterday, good for only 13th place and more than 2s behind Japan's Kosuke Hagano, the top qualifier with a time of 52.13s.
On Tuesday, Thorpe failed to qualify in the 100m freestyle and the 100m individual medley.
