The 23-year-old from Ticino improved his own record in the 50m diving by seven hundredths. Now Ponti is the favorite for the gold medal in Wednesday evening’s final.
Noè Ponti finishes in his main 50m dolphin discipline after 21.43 seconds.
(sda) Noè Ponti swam to the final at the World Short Course Championships in Budapest with a world record in the 50 m dolphin. The 23-year-old from Ticino bettered his own record by seven centuries.
Ponti managed to find his best control after 21.43 seconds. At the beginning of November he set a time of 21.50 seconds in Singapore. During the morning, Ponti almost missed the world record. In 21.53 seconds he set the World Cup record, which he then smashed again in the evening.
“I swam and it went well,” Ponti explained after reaching the final. «You can’t make any mistakes over 50 m. A mistake costs a lot.” He was focused and wanted to swim faster than the others. “That he was.”
As in the morning heats, Nyls Korstanje was the second fastest swimmer. However, the Dutchman lost almost four tenths to the Swiss and clocked in at 21.81 seconds. Now Ponti is the favorite for the gold medal in Wednesday evening’s final.
Things didn’t go so well for Roman Mityukov, who obviously missed out on a place in the semi-finals of the 100m backstroke. The 24-year-old from Geneva, who won Olympic bronze more than twice over the distance in Paris in the summer, only finished ninth in his preliminary run in 51.74 seconds.