Naqvi’s poor performance meant that the national men’s freestyle 100m record is still held by Army’s Mohammad Maroof. PHOTO: REUTERS/FILE
KARACHI: Pakistan’s Syed Mazhar Hussain Naqvi failed to break the national record as he clocked 58.40 seconds at the Fina World Swimming Championships 2013 men’s freestyle 100-metre event in Barcelona yesterday.
He finished 76th out of 80 participants in the event.
Naqvi had qualified for the world championships after a personal best of 58.25 seconds. However, he finished 10.69 seconds behind Australia’s James Magnussen.
Earlier, the 19-year-old also participated in the men’s 50m butterfly event where he finished in 68th place among 78 participants, clocking 27.11 seconds. Naqvi’s poor performance meant that the national men’s freestyle 100m record is still held by Army’s Mohammad Maroof. He remains the only Pakistani, who won gold after clocking 55.60 seconds in the 100m freestyle competition, a record he set at the National Championships in 1991.
The Pakistan Swimming Federation (PSF) is fielding four athletes in eight events at the World Championships, with Naqvi and 13-year-old Haris Bandey in the male events. Lianna Swan and Olympics participant Anam Bandey participated in the female competitions.
While the 15-year-old Swan managed to break two national women’s records and bettered her own time in the 200m individual medley and 100m breaststroke competitions, Naqvi failed to accomplish the feat.
Anam will compete in the 200m breaststroke event today. She qualified after clocking a time of two minutes and 53 seconds.
Published in The Express Tribune, August 1st, 2013.
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