BANGKOK, Aug 10: Four-time Olympic medallist Kaitlin Sandeno of the United States added a World University Games swimming gold to her collection on Friday, winning the 200-metre individual medley.

A former world record holder as part of the US 4-X-200 relay team that won gold at the 2004 Athens Olympics, Sandeno finished in a Games-record time of 2min, 12.13sec.

Yana Klochkova of the Ukraine, a former world record holder in the 400 individual medley, was second in 2:13.15. Klochkova held the previous Games mark of 2:13.32 set in 2003.

The two duelled throughout the race before Sandeno, competing in her first University Games, pulled away on the last lap. Svetlana Karpeeva of Russia was 1.2sec behind Klochkova to take bronze.

Meanwhile, Russia lead the overall medal count with six gold medals, three silver and four bronze, thanks to the accuracy of the Russia’s shooting team and wins in the women’s shot put and pole vault.

On the second full day of medal events, Russia’s 50-metre pistol team of Leonid Ekimov, Alexey Gnidchenko and Andrey Brayko won gold with a score of 1,658 points. Ekimov won gold on his own in the individual competition.

The US picked up their second swim gold of the night when the American men won the 4-X-100 freestyle relay in 3:16.06, more than 2/1-2sec ahead of second-place Canada.

In other swim finals, Canadian Mackenzie Downing won the women’s 100-metre butterfly in 58.88sec, Japan’s Aya Terakawa took gold in the women’s 50-metre backstroke and Germany’s Britta Steffen won the women’s 100-metre freestyle gold.

The US rebounded from a big loss against Lithuania to beat another men’s basketball favourites on Friday.

The Americans, represented by the University of Northern Iowa, defeated Angola 84-26 to even their record at 1-1 in preliminary play.

The American women, represented by the University of North Carolina-Charlotte, lost their first basketball game after two straight wins. Russia, led by Evgenia Belyakova’s 24 points, won 78-42.

The American men’s volleyball team won their second straight match, beating Sweden 25-18, 25-21, 25-21.

Elsewhere at the games on Friday, a senior doping control official said he expects advanced testing to yield drug cheats.—AP