Nigel SimonT&T's Dylan Carter missed out on a first ever medal at the 13th FINA World Short Course (25m) Swimming Championships when he ended fourth in the men's 200m freestyle final at the WFCU Centre, Windsor, Ontario, Canada on Wednesday night.
Entering the eight-man final as the fastest qualifier, Carter lined up in lane four, but after the first 50m he found himself in seventh spot with a split of 23.99 seconds, however he over the next 50m he climbed into medal contention and fourth with a split of 25.98.
Over the final 100m Carter had splits of 26.52 and 25.99 respectively, and was not able to move into the medal spots as Korean Tae-Hwan Park, the seventh fastest in the heats led from start to finish for the gold medal in a new Championship and Asian record of one minute, 41.03 seconds.
It was the second gold in two nights for the Korean, who tested positive for testosterone in 2014 and served an 18-month ban, after he claimed 400m freestyle gold on the opening day of action.
Olympic Games silver medal winner Chad Le Clos of South Africa, the Olympic, World and Commonwealth Games champion as well as the Commonwealth record holder in the 50m and 100m butterfly moved from seventh to second on the final turn for a 1:41.65 clocking and silver, just ahead of Russia's Aleksandr Krasnyky (1:41.95 mins) and Carter, who got home in 1:42.48 minutes, a new national record to lower his mark from in the heats earlier in the day.
It was the fastest podium ever over 200m at the little pool event, the first sub 1:42 top three and a pace slither ahead of the 2010 top three of USA's Ryan Lochte's 1:41.08 and efforts of 1:41.70 and 1:42.02.
The others to finish were joint fifth placed finishers South African Myles Brown (1:43.22) and Australian Daniel Smith (1:43.22), Finland's Matias Koski (1:43.51) and Denmark's Anders Lie Nielsen (1:43.69)
On Wednesday morning, Carter, a 20-year-old University of Southern California student and 2016 Olympian won the ninth of 11th heats in an impressive one minute, 42.90 seconds to become the fastest qualifier overall and also smashed the national record set by Olympic bronze medal winner George Bovell of one minute, 44.81 established in 2004.
Today, Carter a career six-time All-American and three-time NCAA and Pac-12 relay champion, who opted to skip Tuesday's 100m backstroke to focus on the 200m freestyle will return to action in the men's 50m freestyle butterfly.