Cate Campbell, 17, put behind her disappointment in the 100m free at Aussie nationals to lead the way thrpugh to semis of the 50m free ahead of new-kid-on-the-senior-blocks, Yolane Kukla 14.
Those two had been favourites for the 100m crown, but Campbell missed the cut to finish 9th in semis and Kukla stopped the clock first in 54.50 in the final only to find herself DQ'd for a false-start.
Both Campbell and Kukla have since displayed the quality of the champion: set it aside, get back in and try again.
This morning in Sydney, Campbell, already a medal winner on the world stage, clocked 25.35sec, to 25.65sec for Kukla, who has made her first senior Dolphins team at this meet. Kukla has withdrawn from the 100m 'fly final, for which she qualified in 6th slot, to focus on the 50m free semi.
If the teenager crew was in fine fettle on the 4th morning at Commonwealth Games trials, so was the 30-something of the hour: Geoff Huegill, 31 who in the 50m 'fly yesterday realised his dream of swimming like Dolphins can swim once more 12 years after winning his first Commonwealth title, qualified for the 100m semis in second behind the man he pipped for the one-lap crown, training partner and fellow Olympic bronze medal winner, Andrew Lauterstein, 53.05 to 53.40, with Mitchell Patterson next through in 53.43sec.
Multi-eventer of the week, Emily Seebohm, 17, was to be found aiming for a 5th gold medal, taking lane four of the first semi of the 50m backstroke in 28.79sec, with the top place reserved by Belinda Hocking in 28.47sec.
Drama in the heats was to be found in the 400m medley, where national age-group champion Thomas Fraser-Holmes was disqualified and then reinstated. The 18-year-old was judged to have turned over too soon at the backstroke turn, like Olympic champ Aaron Peirsol. But in a decision that aped what unfolded back at the 2004 Games in Athens to the backstroker of the decade 8, over-ruled the eye of an official and the race favourite was back in the swim, his 4:23.80 granting him lane four, next to 16-year-old Jayden Hadler, on 4:25.79.
