Park Tae-hwan wins 400-meter freestyle at world championships

SHANGHAI, July 24 (Yonhap) -- South Korean swimmer Park Tae-hwan won the men's 400-meter freestyle race at the 2011 World Aquatics Championships here Sunday. At the Oriental Sports Center, Park finished in 3 minutes, 42.04 seconds. Sun Yang of China was second at 3:43.24, and Paul Biedermann of Germany finished third at 3:44.14. Park had qualified seventh among eight finalists with a heat time of 3:46.74. But in the final, Park charged ahead from the start and opened a huge gap with 100 meters left. This was Park's second straight world title in this distance. Park came up a little short of his personal-best time of 3:41.53, the gold medal-winning time from last year's Asian Games in Guangzhou, China.