Swimming: Cooke thrives in unhelpful conditions

With the Commonwealth Games looming, the organisers of the National Championships will be ruing their choice of venue after the event got off to a lacklustre start yesterday.

The swimmers were presented with a stern test in overcoming the cumbersome racing conditions of the archaic pool here.

Against the odds, Rebecca Cooke was the most inspiring last night. She won the 400 metres freestyle in a world-class time of 4min 14.16sec.

But it was a case of too little, too late for Bath's Nicola Jackson, who won the 100m butterfly in 1:00.76sec, but she will play no part in the Commonwealth Games after failing to qualify at the selection trials.

The Commonwealth and European record holder James Gibson had a rare mid-season victory in men's 50m breaststroke, winning in 28.34sec.

Victory in the 50m freestyle final was merely a face-saving exercise for the 32-year-old Mark Foster, who finished more than a second adrift of his British record in 23.25sec.