Farhan loses out in Swimming

Rio de Janeiro : Bahrain’s 19-year old Farhan Saleh Farhan was eliminated after the qualifying round of the men’s 50 metres freestyle swimming competition last night despite a brave swim at the Olympic Aquatics Centre in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Making his debut at the Olympics, Farhan finished his heat in second place clocking 24.61 seconds to finish behind the winner Hilal Hemed Hilal of Tanzania (23.70 seconds), but was unable to break his personal record of 23.98 seconds over the distance.

Overall, Farhan the Bahraini flag bearer at the opening ceremony finished 58th out of 85 swimmers from the 11 heats, but was way off a top 16 semi-final qualifying spot (taking place later last night) as the top 13 fastest qualifiers all finished under 22 seconds.

The top six fastest swimmers were - Andriy Hovorov (Ukraine, 21.49), Nathan Adrian (US, 21.61), fifth placed finalist in London, Anthony Ervin (US, 21.63), defending champion and gold medal winner in London, Florent Manaudou (France, 21.72), Cameron McEvoy (Australia, 21.80) and Vladimir Morozov (Russia, 21.81).

In Farhan’s heat the third to eighth places went to Samson Opuakpo (Nigeria, 24.85), Olim Kurbanov (Tajikistan, 25.77), Giordan Harris (Marshall Islands, 25.81), Joshua Ekirikubinza Tibatemwa (Uganda, 25.98), Billy-Scott Irakoze (Burundi, 26.36) and Eloi Imaniraguha (Rwanda, 26.43) respectively.

Bahrain is in action three times today in Shooting, Athletics which gets underway and Swimming.

One of Bahrain’s best shooters 25-year old Mahmood Ali Haji participates in the 50 metre Rifle Prone at the Olympic Shooting Centre and is up against 46 other competitors starting at 3pm Bahrain time with qualifiers, followed later by the final.

Abraham Kipchirchir Rotich kicks off Bahrain’s highly anticipated athletics campaign at 4.10pm in heat 1 of 7 of the men’s 800 metres.