T&T swimmer Dylan Carter earned bronze medals in both the men’s 100 metres freestyle and 50 metres butterfly finals for London Roar on the second and final day of the 2021 International Swimming League (ISL) four-team finals in Eindhoven, Holland on Saturday.
The two bronze medals along with his silver won on Friday carried Carter's final season tally to 23 medals, inclusive of seven gold, eight silver and eight bronze.
At the end of the ten-match day preliminary rounds in November, Carter won nine medals, (4 gold, 3 silver and 2 bronze) before he added 11 medals in three semifinal match days playoff swims that comprised (3 gold, 4 silver and 4 bronze).
Despite the impressive medal haul, Carter and his London Roar teammates had to settle for the third spot of the four teams overall with 393.5 points, to finish ahead of his former team, LA Current which placed fourth with 305.5. Carter also ended in the third spot as part of the LA Current team in 2019 and 2020.
Energy Standard, the inaugural league champions in 2019 reclaimed the title from Cali Condors with 534 points, 12 more than Cali Condors after taking a 21 points lead into the final day, 271 to 250.
Swimming from lane one of the freestyle event the 25-year-old two-time Olympian Carter recovered from a joint fifth-placed position over the first 50 metres with LA Current’s Kristian Gkolomeev in 22.56 to get home in 23.89, only behind eventual winner and club-mate Kyle Chalmers’ second-leg time of 23.84 for a 46.45 clocking at the Pieter Van Den Hoogenband Stadium.
The time by Carter was just shy of his national record of 46.39 set last week as the lead-off leg in the 4x100 freestyle relay.
Chalmers won gold in 45.73 seconds while Cali Condors’ Justin Ress took silver in 45.93
The other finishers in the event were LA Current’s Maxime Rooney (46.84), Energy Standard’s Adam Barrett (46.94), LA Current’s Kristian Gkolomeev (47.05), Cali Condors’ Kacper Majchrzak (47.44), and Energy Standard’s James Guy (47.66)
A graduate of the University of Southern California and Commonwealth Games swimming medallist for T&T, Carter also got bronze in the 50m butterfly in 22.36 seconds to trail Energy Standard’s Ben Proud (22.18), and LA Current’s Tom Shields (22.27).
The quintet of Cali Condors’ Jose Angel Martinez (22.69), Energy Standard’s Chad Le Clos (22.83), London Roar’s Vini Lanza (22.99), Cali Condors’ Jesse Puts (23.04), and Gkolomeev (23.14) were the other finishers in the race.
And in the 50m butterfly skins, Carter placed fifth in 22.39 and failed to advance to the semifinals with Ben Proud (22.30), Shields (22.31), Caeleb Dressel (22.33) and Adam Barrett (22.35) the qualifiers.
Dressell then won the semis in 22.77 followed by Shields (23.09) as both men booked their places in the final ahead of Barrett (23.33) and Proud (23.74).
And in the final Dressel won in 23.05 with Shields, second in 23.40.
On Saturday, Carter got silver as part of the London Roar 4x100m freestyle relay quartet.
The 25-year-old Carter swam the final leg in 48.15 seconds but could not hold onto the top spot on the way to the silver medal in three minutes, 04.84 seconds.
Australian Olympian Chalmers had given London Roar the lead with a first-leg of 45.80 which was maintained by Duncan Scott (46.62) and Katsumi Nakamura (46.27) before Cali Condors’ Ress’ 45.43 final-leg earned his team gold in 3:04.82.
The trio of Majchrzak (46.69), Dressel (45.99) and Puts (46.71) were the other swimmers for Cali Condors while LA Current took bronze in 3:06.01 thanks to Rooney (46.56), Brett Pinfold (46.96), Apostolos Christou (46.25), and Gkolomeev (46.24).
In his lone individual event on the day, Carter had to settle for sixth in the men’s 50m freestyle in 21.15 seconds, only ahead of Puts (21.30) and Rooney (21.35).
England’s Ben Proud won for the Energy Standard in 20.40, with Chalmers a distant second in 20.96 followed by the bronze winner, Ress who touched in 21 seconds flat.
Gkolomeev was fourth in 21.07 and Kliment Koleshinkov ended fifth in 21.10.
In the men’s 4x100 metres medley relay, the London Roar ‘B’ quartet of Christian Diener, Sam Williamson, Dylan Carter and Katisumi Nakamura combined for a time of three minutes, 25.41 seconds for the sixth spot.
The Cali Condors foursome of Coleman Stewart, Nick Fink, Dressel and Ress pumped out a time of three minutes, 19.64 seconds to take the gold medal in a new American record time.
Their time-sliced .34 seconds off of the previous American Record of 3:19.98 that’s been on the books for nearly three years and also fell just .48 seconds outside of the world record of 3:19.16, a time Russia set back in 2009.
Stewart fired off an opening split of 49.62 seconds before Fink took over with a super quick 55.21 breaststroke split. Dressel’s 49.01 butterfly leg kept the squad in the lead before Ress’ anchor of 45.80 sealed the deal.
The previous American record was conducted at the 2018 FINA Short Course World Championships, with teammates Ryan Murphy (49.63), Andrew Wilson (56.84), Dressel (48.28) and Ryan Held (45.23) getting the job done.
The second spot went to Energy Standard’s Kolesnikov (49.90), Iilya Shymanovich (55.38), Chad Le Clos (48.92) and Adam Barrett (46.41) in a combined 3:20.61 minutes while London Roar ‘A’ quartet of Guilherme Guido (50.18), Ross Murdoch (57.41), Lanza (50.14) and Kyle Chalmers (45.78) got bronze in 3:23.51.