Sporting Moments of 2006 I - March 16th

In the first of my picks of the sporting moments of the year, I have picked the moment that kicked started one of Scotlands most sucsessful Commonweatlth Games ever...

Scot McClatchey wins gold in 200m

“Scotland's Caitlin McClatchey beat Australian swimming star Libby Lenton to win a sensational gold medal in the pool in the women's 200m freestyle. The 20-year-old overhauled favourite Lenton, who had been targeting a record of seven golds, in the final metres to win the race in a new Games record. McClatchey finished in one minute 57.25 seconds with Lenton back in 1:57.51”

And we were off… In the end it was one of Scotland’s most successful Commonwealth Games ever, finishing 6th in the medal table, with 29 medals, 11 of which were Gold medals

All the athletes that contributed deserve a mention, in Athletics Chris Baillie, took 110m hurdles silver, and Lee McConnell, won 400m hurdles bronze. Our Cyclists, led by Olympic champion Chris Hoy won 6 medals. There were Gold medals in Bowls and Boxing too.

However it was the swimmers that started the event off. McClatchey’s win in the first day appeared to galvanise the Scotland team, like Jason Queally’s Olympic Gold on the first day of the Sydney Olympics seemed to galvanize the Great Britain team. McClatchey won another gold, while David Carry & Gregor Tait also won 2 swimming gold’s to add to the 6 silver and bronze won by Scottish swimmers in the pool.

I also picked it because of all the doom and gloom surrounding our more (mostly English) higher profile sporting failures this year, who have clouded our view of how the year in sport unfolded. To remind people that there were British sucsesses, all the more sweeter because it came clad in blue and white...

This blog was originaly posted on 27th December 2006 @ uk.360.yahoo.com/silvertdevil69