Kiwi swim trio on the podium in Tokyo World Cup

New Zealand swimmers finished with a clean sweep of the podium on the first day of the FINA World Cup in Tokyo today.

Melissa Ingram took out the women’s 200m backstroke, Matthew Stanley was second in the 400m freestyle and their fellow Swimming New Zealand High Performance Centre training mate, Glenn Snyders was third in the 50m breaststroke.

Toyko is the seventh of eight stops on the FINA Arena World Cup circuit around the globe with the final stop in Singapore at the weekend.

Ingram, 27, won her fourth final of the series after a stern battle with fellow Olympian Marie Kamimura (Japan), winning in 2:05.39. She led the whole way but by the slimmest of margins, just 1/100^th of a second in front at the 150m mark before holding off the Japanese over the final 50m.

Stanley, 20, resumed his battle with American Michael Klueh in the 400m freestyle, after the New Zealander pipped him in the last round in Beijing.

He again started conservatively to be sixth after the 100m before working his way to third at the 350m mark. Stanley pushed into second but could not pip Klueh, finishing second in 3:42.21.

Snyders, who has four wins to his credit in the series, had to settle for third in the 50m breaststroke, won by Olympi8c medallist Christian Sprenger (AUS). It was a superb battle with Sprenger, Japan’s Yuuki Okajima and Snyders, with 25/100ths of a second separating the trip, which sets up for a superb battle in the 100m on the second day.

In other racing North Shore’s Mitchell Donaldson was 15^th in heats of the 400m individual medley and Taranaki’s Dylan Dunlop-Barrett 26^th in heats of the 400m freestyle in 3:57.13.

Day 1 results:

50m breaststroke: Christian Sprenger (AUS) 26.62, 1; Yuuki Okajima (JPN) 26.70, 2; Glenn Snyders (NZL) 26.86, 3.
200m backstroke: Melissa Ingram (NZL) 2:05.39, 1; Marie Kamimura (JPN) 2:05.98, 2; Jenny Mensing (GER) 2:06.95, 3.
400m freestyle: Michael Klueh (USA) 3:40.23, 1; Matthew Stanley (NZL) 3:42.21, 2; Naito Ehara (JPN) 3:43.30, 3.