TOKYO (AFP) - Athens dual gold medallist Kosuke Kitajima on Wednesday easily won his ticket for the Beijing Olympics with a win in the men's 100-metre breaststroke at Japan's national swimming championships.
Also qualifying for the Summer Games in August were Olympic bronze medallists Tomomi Morita, Yuta Suenaga, Junichi Miyashita on the men's side, and Olympic bronze medallist Yuko Nakanishi and Yuka Kato on the women's side.
"I was under heavy pressure to set a new national record. If I can, I want to race it again," Kitajima said after finishing in 59.67 seconds, narrowly missing his previous national record of 53.85.
Suenaga also made the Beijing cut in 1:00.72, ahead of Makoto Yamashita in third at 1:01.16.
"It was not a bad race. I must accept this time and then I'm going to concentrate on the 200 metres to swim my own race," said Kitajima.
"The time was not good enough at all. It will be difficult to win the gold medal with this time. I must start to build myself up again towards the Olympics," he added.
It was Kitajima's ninth straight national title in the 100 metres.
In the men's 100-metre backstroke, Morita clocked 54.03 to win his seventh title, ahead of Miyashita in 54.37 and Ryosuke Irie third in 54.69.
"I feel these four years were really long. I managed to keep swimming. I just want to thank that I'm now in this position," said Morita.
"This is only the starting line. My time is not good enough. I'd like to show the world that the Japanese swimmers are the fastest at the Olympics."
In the women's competition, Nakanishi, who won bronze in Athens in the 200-metre butterfly, set a new national record of 58.52 to win back her third title, beating defending champion Kato and Ayako Doi.
Kato clocked in at 58.55 ahead of Doi at 58.65. Both cleared the qualifying time, but only two from the same discipline can go to Beijing.
"I know I'm in good form right now. Even though I was behind for most of the race, I was calm. I was confident. But I was surprised that I beat her," said Nakanishi, who overtook Kato in the last five metres of the race.
"I can get into the 200 metres with a lot of confidence. I want to be full of confidence when the Olympic Games start."
