Sun Yang was chasing gold again Sunday, leading the way into the men’s 200m freestyle semi-finals just one day after he gave China it’s first men’s Olympic swimming title. In a field packed with talent from around the globe, newly-minted 400m freestyle gold medallist Sun topped the qualifying times in 1min 46.24sec, edging American Ryan Lochte in their heat by 21-hundredths of a second. Lochte, who detroyed a field that included 14-time Olympic gold medallist Michael Phelps to win the 400m medley on Saturday night, said his main aim of the morning was to secure a good lane for his semi-final swim. “It’s a new day and new race,” Lochte said. “I did what I had to do and hopefully I’ll be a lot faster tonight.” France’s Yannick Agnel, who topped the world rankings coming into the Games, was third-fastest ahead of Russian Danila Izotov and South Korean Park Tae-Hwan — who took silver behind Sun in the 400m free after a rollercoaster day that saw him disqualified in the heats and then reinstated to the final.
