GERMAN Paul Biedermann was stunned to break Ian Thorpe’s seven-year-old world record in claiming gold in the 400m freestyle at the World Championships in Rome, Italy, on Sunday before hailing the Australian as a “legend.”
Biedermann beat Tunisian 800m freestyle Olympic champion Oussama Mellouli into second with Zhang Lin of China finishing third.
But in doing so, the German 22-year-old sliced one-thousandth of a second off Thorpe’s record by posting a new mark of 3 minutes and 40.07 seconds.
“I was never expecting to break this world record,” said Biedermann.
“I was focusing on Monday (200m free) and didn’t expect this at all and I’m so happy about it.”
Biedermann said he was lost for words when he realized he had set the new mark.
“It was just an amazing feeling, I couldn’t describe it. It’s a thing that you only live through one time in your life,” he said.
“I didn’t expect it at all. I thought it would be faster than the semifinal but it was a really great race. That pushed it to get fast times.”
Biedermann trailed Mellouli through the first three-quarters of the race before kicking on in the final 100m to go clear.
He said he had used the Tunisian to set his pace through the first part of the race.
“My last 100m is always my fastest, I try to get it out of me as fast as I can and luckily it was really great,” he added.
“Mellouli led for a long time and he really pushed me. I just said to myself: ‘don’t let him go, stay at his feet.’ At the end I was really glad to beat him.”
Biedermann paid tribute to his predecessor as world record holder, the five-time Olympic gold medalist Thorpe, who set 13 world records during his career.
“He’s a living and swimming legend, one of my swimming idols. I watched him at home on TV and never expected to swim that fast or beat his world record,” said the German.
(SD-Agencies)