Trickett loses chance to defend Olympic swimming title

Libby Trickett missed out on a chance of defending her Olympic title with a third placing in the 100 metres butterfly at the Australian Olympic selection trials in Adelaide on Friday. The 27-year-old Trickett is on the comeback trail after a short-lived retirement, but found Alicia Coutts and Jessicah Schipper too strong in a hotly-contested 100m butterfly final. Coutts, a silver medallist at last year's Shanghai world championships, won the final in 57.59 seconds ahead of Beijing bronze medallist Schipper in 57.88sec and both qualified for the event at the London Games in July. Trickett was third in 58.64sec and six-hundredths of a second inside the Olympic A qualifying time but not in the top two places in the event for London. "I can't be disappointed," Trickett said. "I did what I went out there to do tonight, I went out after it. "I'm just so pumped to get on the podium to be honest, because after yesterday (heats and semi-final) I was unsure if that was a possibility. "So to get as close as I did is hugely confidence building. I can't have any regrets. "When you have come through the last two years that I have come through, to perform as well as I did... I'm incredibly proud," she said. Trickett has won six Olympic medals, three of them gold, along with 14 world championship medals. Coutts won five gold medals at the 2010 Delhi Commonwealth Games and won three medals at last year's world titles. Schipper, who was the fastest qualifier into the final, has won 10 medals at five world championships back to 2003.