I am happy with my time — Kirsty

Sport
BY FANUEL VIRIRI SEVEN-TIME Olympic champion, Kirsty Coventry is set to compete at two major international swimming meets in Rome and Monaco next month where she hopes to better her records.

The swimming sensation has a particularly busy schedule this year as she prepares for the World Championships and 2012 Olympics Games in London. After taking a rest from swimming last year, Coventry opened her season in January, when she competed at the South Africa Long Course International Invitational Meet in Port Elizabeth and posted good results.

She was back in the pool at the Maria Lenk Trophy in Brazil early this month where she also had some good results.

The 27-year-old sprightly swimmer broke South American records in three individual events. She bagged a gold medal in the 200m backstroke after clocking 2.08.41. She scooped another gold in the 400m individual medley clocking 4.37.21. She also clocked 2.11.36 in the 200m individual medley to bag another gold medal.

She further raked a silver medal in the 100m backstroke in 1.00.76. She also competed in the 4 x 200m freestyle relay and her team won a gold medal.Coventry’s team was back in the pool for the 4x100m freestyle relay and they picked a silver medal. The team also won a gold medal in the 4x100m individual medley relay.

Speaking from her Johannesburg base, Coventry said she was her usual best but was hoping to better her records at the upcoming meets.“I was happy with my times (in Brazil). I would have liked to have gone a bit faster in my 200 individual medley but I know getting the times I want is a process. I am on the right path for World Champs and Olympics,” Coventry said.

“I am back in Johannesburg and I have started training again. My next competitions are Mare Nostrum in Monaco on June 11 and 12, and Sette Colli in Rome from  June 17 to 19.”

The Mare Nostrum Tour is a three-legged swimming meetings and one of the prestigious championships in the world.

This year the tour will stop in Barcelona from June 4-5 but Coventry will not be taking part. The tour will move to Canet en Roussillon on June 8-9, which Coventry is also set to miss. She is taking part in the last leg of the swimming series in Monaco on from June 11-12.

Coventry will also take part at the 48th edition of the International Open Swimming Trophy also known as the Sette Colli in Rome. Coventry is the reigning world champion in the 200m backstroke. She won the world title with a world record time of 2.04.81 in Rome and came second in the 400m individual medley.