The 24-year-old Spanish winner earned her fourth gold medal Friday by winning the women’s 400 freestyle at the FINA World Short Course Championships.
She touched in at 3:55.76 to win the middle-distance freestyle event, smashing Katie Hoff’s meet record of 3:57.07 from 2010.
The barely time missed Belmonte Garcia’s own world record of 3:54.52 set last year in Berlin on the FINA World Cup circuit.
Belmone Garcia came in ahead of The Netherlands’ Sharon van Rouwendaal and Chinas’ Zhang Yufei.
Belmonte Garcia is just the third European woman to ever win four gold medals at a single World Short Course Championship (200 IM, 400 IM, 400 free, 800 free). She joins The Netherlands’ Marleen Veldhuis (2008) and Sweden’s Therese Alshammar (2000, 2002).
Belmonte Garcia also joins USA’s Janet Evans as just the second swimmer to win both the women’s 400 and 800 freestyle events at the same worlds. Evans did it back in 1993.
Mireia Belmonte Garcia is a golden girl again… The 24-year-old Spanish swimmer cruised to victory in the women’s 800 freestyle on Thursday to claim her third gold medal at the FINA World Short Course Championships. It only took two nights, and Spain’s Mireia Belmonte Garcia already matched her gold-medal output…
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