Scottish Pair Strike Swimming Gold

Scotland's swimmers won two gold medals today as they made a dream start to the Commonwealth Games.

Caitlin McClatchey struck first, destroying home favourite Libby Lenton's bid for a record medal haul by winning the first swimming gold. The 20-year-old produced a storming finish to overhaul Lenton and smash her personal best with a Games record of one minute 57.25 seconds in the 200m freestyle.

McClatchey, tipped to win gold over her favourite distance of 400m in Melbourne, was in third place through the first half of the race but was always on the shoulder of Australia's Lenton, who had been targeting a seventh gold medal. And she overhauled Lenton and England's Melanie Marshall down the final 50m to stun the large home crowd expecting their female swimmers to carry all before them.

Lenton took silver in 1m57.51secs with Marshall, 24, claiming the bronze in 1:58.11s. "I didn't think I was going to win, it's fantastic," said McClatchey. "It was great to see every seat was full, I just thrived on it. It was a bit of a shock but it's good. When I turned at the last 50 I knew I could win if I put my head down."

An hour later David Carry won the men's 400m freestyle to give Scotland their second gold in the pool. Carry overtook Welshman David Davies on the penultimate lap and surged clear to win in a time of three minutes 48.17 seconds.

Canada's Andrew Hurd also finished strongly to snatch the silver in 3:49.08 while Davies, better known as a 1500m swimmer, weakened on the last lap to settle for third in 3:49.44.

Australia have traditionally dominated the men's 400m but finished out of the medals after world record holder Ian Thorpe and reigning world champion Grant Hackett both withdrew from the Games because off injury and illness. Craig Stevens, who was called up last week when Thorpe pulled out, finished fourth.