Carter 4th in new 200 free record

Carter, 20-yearsold, touched the wall in 1:42.48, to place fourth in the final while lowering his own record of 1:42.90 set in the preliminary round.

Winning gold was South Korea’s Taehwan Park in 1:41.03 while South Africa’s Chad Le Clos (1:41.65) and Russian Aleksandr Krasnykh (1:41.95) grabbed silver and bronze respectively.

Carter had earlier produced an impressive swim in the preliminary of the 200m freestyle in a national record 1:42.90 to become the fastest qualifier in the event.

Carter smashed the 200 freestyle record of 1:44.81 set by 2004 Olympic bronze medallist George Bovell III in 2004. Carter won his heat nine comfortably ahead of Korea’s Taewan Park (1:44.09) and Belgium’s Pieter Timmers, with Park emerging the 7th fastest qualifier moving on to the final.

Franz Huggins, Carter’s locally based coach was pleased with the performance in the prelims.

“The swim this morning looked very controlled. He split his race perfectly and really looked smooth throughout. With two Olympic 200 freestyle medallists in the final with him tonight, he will have his hands full, but there is no doubt a place on the podium is the goal.”