Brilliant Bronze for Shortt at World Championships

Ireland’s John Shortt has won a brilliant bronze medal in 50m Backstroke at the World Aquatics Junior Championships in Romania, adding to the 100m Backstroke gold he won on Wednesday.

In a thrilling race, where joint gold medals were awarded, the 18-year-old, swimming in an outside lane, grabbed the bronze in 25.06 seconds, lowering the lifetime best of 25.36 that he swam in Thursday’s semi-final. The gold medals went to Italy’s Daniele del Signore and neutral athlete Georgii Iakovlev in 24.91.

A delighted Shortt said ‘It feels pretty good, not unexpected, we knew we could do it tonight and I’ve got to shout out Roisin (physio) who got me right after the 100m Back Final so a big shout out to her, and you know when you’ve got a lane, you’ve got a chance and that’s exactly what happened tonight.’

Reflecting on the race he added ‘I thought my start wasn’t great, as in my actual start, I kind of felt like I not slipped, but my feet kind of went down just a small bit when I pushed off, but, my first 25m was pretty good and I’d no idea what was going on around me so I just starting pulling like a dog and you know that was it, I touched the wall and got a medal, so happy out’.

The National Centre Limerick swimmer will be back in the pool on Sunday, for his main event, the 200m Backstroke. There is no semi-final in the event, the top eight swimmers from the heats progressing to Sunday evening’s Final.

Results– Day 4 Finals Friday 22^nd August

Schedule – Day 6 Heats Sunday 24^th August

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