Oct. 17, 2011

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GUADALAJARA, Mexico - California freshman Catherine Breed and alumna Madison Kennedy won gold medals for the United States on the first two days of the Pan American Games swimming competition at the Scotiabank Aquatic Center.

Breed won the 200-meter freestyle in a time of 2:00.08 in the Oct. 16 final after posting the fastest time (2:00.81) in the preliminaries earlier that day.

"This is definitely one of my biggest accomplishments so far in swimming," Breed said. "I would have liked to have gone faster, but I'm not going to complain with that time. The pool felt good. The altitude probably hurt just a little bit, but the pool felt really good. I really like the energy of the crowd. It's fun to swim with it."

Kennedy led off the victorious U.S. 400-meter freestyle relay, which clocked a meet-record time of 3:40.66 in the final. The former Bear, who ended her Cal career in 2009, also led off the U.S. squad that set the previous Pan Am Games 400-free relay record of 3:40.85 in morning prelims.

"I went the same time both morning and night, so I have to thank my lovely teammates for breaking that record with me," Kennedy said. "We all train with separate teams, but we all come together under the same flag. Every time we go to games like this, it's really cool to know that we all train apart, but we all come together to race."

Back in the United States, the Golden Bears return to action when they host their home opener against Utah in a Pac-12 Conference dual meet at 1 p.m. on Friday.