Golden Girl
Teenage sensation Marni Burger made Australia’s first night in the pool a golden one by smashing the field in the junior girls 200 metre butterfly.
From Daniel Garb, Wingate
The 16-year-old Victorian swam a time of 2.19.29 in her pet event – 4 seconds faster than her nearest rival to win Australia’s second gold medal at the Maccabiah Games. She told Hayom: “I’m very happy. Great Maccabiah!”
Marnie also captured silver in the 100 metres freestyle living up to her billing as one of the Aussie delegation’s big medal hopes. Fellow gun junior Ashleigh Smart finished fourth in the same race
Earlier, Greg Shein went close to ending a 16 year individual medal drought in the open division by swimming a personal best to finish fourth in the 200 metres breaststroke.
Junior Joshua Balsim was another to just miss out on a medal for Australia after leading the 200 metres butterfly for the majority of the race only to fall away in the final 50 and finish fourth.
Other highlights from the evening included a personal best from David Schnabl in the 100 metres freestyle won by Olympic champion Jason Lezak.
He finished eighth but was delighted with his time and thrilled to swim next to the three time Olympic gold medallist who obliterated the field to win his first gold medal of the meet.
“Lezak and I unzipped each other’s suits after the race so that was the highlight for me,” he said.
Smart finished 5th in the junior 200 metre breaststroke final to go with her impressive freestyle race, Yuriy Burunov was 7th in the 200 metre butterfly while Avi Bart and Julian Kowal both swam personal bests in the Juniors.
