Pan Pacific Swimming Championships Day 4 Heats

Mitchell Donaldson made it the ninth in the team to qualify for an A Final this morning at the Pan Pacific Swimming Championships on the Gold Coast.

Donaldson produced an encouraging heat swim of 2:01.45 to be 12^th fastest overall but sixth qualifier with only two swimmers per nation.

The Sydney-based swimmer was half a second outside his best, going through the butterfly and backstroke in a competitive 56.85 and was 1:31.79 after the breaststroke.

“That was okay, it was just the freestyle that I need to pick up but otherwise okay for a morning swim,” Donaldson said.

North Shore’s Laura Quilter earned a start in the B Final of the women’s freestyle in 26.01s and a chance to go under that 26 second barrier in the final tonight.

Glenn Snyders clocked 2:13.77 to be ninth fastest and seventh qualifier in the 200m breaststroke but has opted out of tonight’s A Final to focus on the men’s 4x100m medley relay.

“I’ve not been focussing on this distance and really I’ve been in taper now for too long with this meet after the Commonwealth Games,” Snyders said.

“I think we can get the boys really up and produce a good relay tonight and I want to play a part in that. I went 59.4 in Glasgow and I want to go even faster than that tonight.”

Wellington’s Emma Robinson joins Lauren Boyle in the fast heat of the 1500m freestyle after a redraw this morning.

The quadrennial Pan Pacific Championships is a five-day meet with full strength teams from USA, Japan, Canada, Australia, the rest of the Pacific and other non-European nations.

Tonight’s finals begin from 7pm from tonight with the 10km open water swim now moved to the freshwater Mermaid Lakes on the coast after health and safety concerns in the Southport Marina after the week of inclement weather here on the Gold Coast.