Neves fourth in the Red Sea

KRISTINA NEVES had never swum for more than one hour at any one time before yesterday.

But thrown in at the deep end of a 10 kilometre open water race in the Red Sea, Neves, 15, swam brilliantly to finish fourth and in a quality international field touch fourth out of 13 in a time of 2hrs 4min. 47sec.

The Guernsey star was one of only four females chosen by the GB selectors for the LEN Open Water Swimming Cup event in Eilat, Israel. One of them was Britain's Olympic star Keri-Ann Payne, who was one of three of the starters not to finish the race.

Neves was bitterly disappointed to miss out on a medal – she was a minute-and-a-half off third – and said the experience was very painful.

A Hungarian, Eva Risztov, won the race in 2hrs 2min. 29sec.