Pieter Coetzé didn’t wait for Saturday to prove he’s the fastest 50m backstroker in Glasgow. He proved it twice on Friday, in the same event, against his own name on the record board both times.
The Pretoria swimmer opened his day with a Commonwealth Games record in the morning heats, touching in 24.45 to top the field at Tollcross. By the time the evening semis rolled around, that mark was already under threat, and the threat was him.
Pieter Coetzé tore into the second semi-final and stopped the clock at 24.29, shaving another sixteen hundredths off the record he’d set that same morning. Nobody else in the field got within half a second of him. It’s now the second-fastest swim of his career, behind only the African record of 24.17 he set at last year’s World Championships in Singapore.
That swim locks in the top seed for Saturday’s final, and with it, a shot at turning his 2022 Commonwealth Games silver into gold.
“Two Games records in one day, in the same event, against himself. That’s not form, that’s a statement!” – 🎙️Jay
He won’t be alone in South African colours on Saturday night. Ruard van Renen won the first semi in a lifetime-best 24.56, shaving two tenths off his morning swim, and joins Coetzé in the final as they both chase a medal.
The rest of Team SA’s session sets up a big Saturday at Tollcross. Erin Gallagher, Caitlin de Lange and Jessica Thompson swept the top three spots across their 50m butterfly semis to book all three South African spots in that final. In the 100m breaststroke, Michael Houlie and Chris Smith both progressed through to Saturday’s decider, with Houlie ripping through the opening 50m in a new African record along the way.
Glasgow’s second night in the pool is shaping up to be one of Team SA’s biggest of the Games.
📸 Images via SA Swimming / BackpagePix
