22 July,2009 03:27 PM IST | | AFP
Britain's Olympic silver medallist Keri-Anne Payne went one better today by winning the gold medal in the 10km open water event at the World Championships.
Payne led more or less from the start and came home in a time of 2hr 01min 37.1sec ahead of Russia's Ekatarina Seliverstova in second with Italy's Martina Grimaldi taking bronze.
A year ago in Beijing, Payne had come within a second and a half of snatching gold but was pipped by Russian eight-time world champion Larisa Ilchenko.
She had the advantage here of not having swam in Tuesday's 5km race, in which Ilchenko had her five-year winning streak in that event snapped by Australian outsider Melissa Gorman.
Ilchenko lined up bidding for a fourth 10km title in a row but just after half distance the Russian pulled out.
That left Payne in the lead and without the greatest open water swimmer of all time to worry about.
Gorman was up there until the closing stages but Seliverstova and Grimaldi proved to be the strongest two of the rest.
Seliverstova had faded from third place to finish fifth in the 5km but this time she was not to be denied and stayed strong to the end, just beating the host swimmer on a photo finish.
