Harrison narrowly misses World University Games medal

Ireland's Ryan Harrison (University of Tennessee) narrowly missed out on a bronze medal today in the 200m Freestyle final at the World University Games in Shenzhen, China.

Although Harrison improved on his heat time to finish in a credible fifth place overall in the final (1:49.18), the Co. Derry swimmer was disappointed not to have had a podium finish. The event was won by Mathew McLean (USA) in 1:47.44, second place went to Clement Lefert (France) in 1:47.78 with the third spot going to Sho Uchida of Japan in 1:49.06.

"To not get a medal on such a narrow margin was disappointing," said Harrison after the race. "I really wanted that third position but I raced hard so I have to be happy with that."

Ireland's women's 4x100m medley relay team of Aisling Cooney (UCD), Fiona Doyle (Calgary), Lorna Cummins (Loughborough) and Bethany Carson (UUJ) placed seventh in their final in a time of 4:13.46.

Meanwhile Chris Bryan has been showing excellent form since his 8th place finish in the 5k open water event at the World Championships last month. Chris finished ninth at a recent 10km marathon test event which was held at the London 2012 open water venue - The Serpentine, Hyde Park on Saturday 13th August. Although the event was not an Olympic qualifier, many of the world's top open water swimmers featured in the race, including recent World Championship winner Thomas Lurz of Germany. This was a key event, used to test the course ahead of the Games next year.

Irish in action tomorrow in Shenzhen are Aisling Cooney in the 50m freestyle and Fiona Doyle in the 100m breaststroke. Shani Stallard goes in the 200m individual medley at the World Junior Swimming Championships after clocking a 1:14.04 in the 100m breaststroke heats today - two .

Issued by Swim Ireland, whose High Performance Programme is supported and funded by the Irish Sports Council