Phelps breaks Olympic record in first heat

Michael Phelps safely cleared the first hurdle in his quest to win eight gold medals yesterday when he broke his Olympic record to qualify fastest for the 400 metres individual medley final.

The American cruised through his heat in four minutes 07.82 seconds, wiping 0.44 seconds off the Olympic record he set to win the gold medal in Athens four years ago.

Hungarian Laszlo Cseh, who finished third behind Phelps at Athens then won the world title in Montreal a year later when Phelps skipped the event, was second fastest in 4:09.26.

Italian Luca Marin was third in 4:10.22 while American Ryan Lochte, who looms as the one of the biggest dangers to Phelps' bid to win an unprecedented eight goals, was fourth in 4:10.33.

Phelps' time was the third fastest and just 2.57 outside the world record of 4:05.25 he set at the US trials six weeks ago to book his place in today's final.

Clean shaven but not wearing a full bodysuit, he was under world record pace halfway through the backstroke leg but eased down over the final freestyle leg to conserve his energy for the final. Australia's Jessicah Schipper topped the qualifiers for the women's 100 metres butterfly heats to book her place in today's semi-finals.

Schipper won her heat in 57.58 seconds and was just 0.12 ahead of American Christine Magnuson and China's Zhou Yafei, who recorded identical times of 57.70 in their respective heats.

Australian world champion Libby Trickett, the favourite to win the gold, qualified 12th fastest in 58.37 while Poland's Otylia Jedrzejczak, the Athens Olympic silver medallist, failed to make the semi-finals after recording the 17th time overall.

Schipper, who holds the world record for 200 butterfly, said she was surprised at her time because she made a number of mistakes during the heat.

"A few things went wrong there but I'm still going in as fastest qualifier and I still have some things to improve on," she said.