T&T's Olympic bronze medal swimmer George Bovell ended his 2014 FINA/Mastbank Swimming World Cup campaign on a high when he copped gold in his pet event, the men's 50 metres freestyle, at the seventh and final leg at the OCBC Aquatic Centre, Singapore, yesterday.
Bovell touched the wall in 21.37 seconds to beat Russian Sergei Fesikov (21.45) and Germany's Steffen Deibler (21.52) into silver and bronze places respectively.
It carried his total haul for the World Cup season to nine: three gold, four silver and two bronze.
The other finishers were South African Roland Schoeman (21.58), Spain's Miguel Ortiz (21.67), Great Britain's Benjamin Proud (21.81), and Canadian duo, Luke Preddie (22.14) and Yuri Kisil (22.21).
Earlier, Bovell was the fastest in heat two of four in 21.60, ahead of Proud (21.88), Hong Kong's Raymond Mak Ho Lun (22.70), USA's Michael Andrew (22.98), Danny Yeo (23.01), Kevin Ong (23.70), Ryan Wee (24.19), Hemaan Cabraal (24.32), Martin Kristofik (24.69) and Ali Alkaabi (25.00).
Bovell's time in the heats was the second best behind Fesikov, who won heat three in 21.48.
On Saturday, the 31-year-old Bovell, swimming in lane six, touched the wall in 26.81 behind South African Roland Schoeman (25.86) and Hungary's Daniel Gyurta (26.59) for bronze in the 50m breaststroke final.
It was only the second medal ever for Bovell competing in the breaststroke event at the World Cup. It was also his second medal in the breaststroke in less than a week: he took bronze as well in Beijing, China with a time of 26.93, behind Schoeman (26.87) and Gyurta (26.91).
The other finalists were USA's Michael Andrew (27.78), Chun Yan Wong (28.15), Kenneth Lim (28.50), Lukas Ming Menkhoff (28.58) and Christopher Cheong (28.97)
Earlier, Bovell, a former NCAA champion, was the top qualifier in the first of three splashes in 28.03 well ahead of Darren Lam (29.33) and Brilliant Chua (30.03) for the fourth fastest time overall.
The quartet of Kelvin Wai How Chan (30.53), Seow Ryan (31.65), Aloysius Jun Jie Lian (31.90) and Abdulla Aldhaheri (32.68) were the other finishers in heat one, but they failed to advance.
Schoeman was the top qualifier overall after he won heat three in 27.06 ahead of Wong (28.44) and Lim (28.64) while Gyurta (27.74), Andrew (27.75), Cheong (29.15) and Menkhoff (29.17) qualified from heat two.
Last year, Bovell was fourth in the 50m breaststroke final in 26.86 seconds to trail Schoeman (25.68), Australian Christian Sprenger (26.24) and Brazilian Felipe Lima (26.84).
Bovell also contested the heats of the men's 100m individual medley, the second of three, and placed second in 55.87 behind Hong Kong's Raymond Mak Ho Lan (55.39).
However, Ma Ho Lan had the eighth and final qualifying time for the gold medal, while Bovell missed qualifying with the tenth fastest time overall.
In the final, Sergei Fesikov again dominated to take gold in 52.09 ahead of Ortiz (52.87) and Tancock (53.74) while Andrew (54.61) was fourth and Wood, fifth, in 54.64.