OLYMPIAN Jasmine Alkhaldi shattered her own national record in the heats of the 100-meter butterfly of the ongoing 2013 Fina World Championships in Barcelona, Spain.
The Filipino swimmer of Saudi descent clocked 1:01.71 in her favorite event, bettering the previous Philippine mark of 1:01.95 she registered in last year’s London Olympics.
The 20-year-old Alkhaldi ranked 35th out of 53 swimmers after the qualifying heats and finished 4.49 seconds behind No.1 qualifier Dana Vollmer of the United States who timed 57.22.
Popular in Saudi Arabian social networking sites after competing in the Olympics, Alkhaldi placed fifth in Heat 3 topped by Egypt’s Farida Osman in 59.85.
Colombia’s Jessica Camposano Rios placed second in 1:00.65 followed by Iris Rosenberger of Turkey (1:01.35) and Chinese Taipei’s Wan Jung-cheng (1:01.61). June Navarro