Outdoor jinx strikes Park again at worlds

ROME (Reuters) - World and Olympic champion Park Tae-hwan is still looking to end his bad run in outdoor pools after failing to reach the 400 meters freestyle final at the world championships on Sunday.

"It's a kind of a jinx but I really want to break it some day," he told reporters. "I'm going to do my best in the 200 and 1,500 meters. I don't think I got enough rest after Beijing."

The South Korean trailed in 12th overall after a lackluster time of 3 minutes, 46.04.

Park was disqualified for a false start in the 400 at the open air pool at the 2004 Athens Olympics and has had other problems.

Olympic 400 freestyle champion Rebecca Adlington only just avoided the same fate as Park when the Briton finished eighth in the heats to just sneak into the final.

World record holder Federica Pellegrini had no such trouble in the heat, bagging a new championship record of 4:01.96.

Another blisteringly hot day greeted the athletes on the first day of swimming competition.

Sweden's Sarah Sjostrom also set a new championship record of 56.76 seconds in the women's 100 butterfly heats where champion Libby Trickett of Australia was not competing.

The championships have been dogged by a row over new hi-tech suits which look set to be banned from 2010 after a raft of world records.

In the men's 50m butterfly heats, world record holder Rafael Munoz and Roland Schoeman both broke the championship record with swims of 22.90 seconds while Australian favorite Brenton Rickard matched their achievement in the 100 breaststroke heats.

"It's a fast time but it doesn't really matter that much. It's about trying to get youlself on that podium come tomorrow night," Rickard said after swimming 58.98.

Australia qualified third for the later final in the women's 4x100 freestyle relay behind championship-record breakers Germany despite news that team member Meagen Nay's brother had been killed in a car crash.

Brazil romped home first in the men's relay in another record for a world meet with United States, without a rested Michael Phelps, qualifying fourth for Sunday's final.

(Additional reporting by Paul Virgo and Ian Simpson; Editing by Nigel Hunt)