Ryan Gambin clocked a new national record in the 100m butterfly heats yesterday but his bold effort was still not enough to advance to the semi-finals of the event at the National Aquatic Centre in Beijing.
Before the Olympic Games, the Australia-based swimmer, who had qualified for the Games on his own merit, declared that he was targeting a place in today' semi-finals, involving the top 16 swimmers.
Swimming in the fourth heat, the 23-year-old had an auspicious start before fading in the final 20 metres to touch home sixth in 53.70 seconds. The time is a new national record and improved his previous best, set in Paris this year, by 0.24 seconds.
Denmark's Jakob Schloett Andkjaer won the heat in 52.24 ahead of Greece's Sotirios Pastras (52.41), Romania's Ioan Stefan Gherghel (52.50), Czech Michal Rubacek (53.53) and Mexico's Juan Jose Veloz (53.58).
India's Ankur Poseria placed behind Gambin in 54.74 while Italy's Mattia Nalesso failed to start the race.
While the top 16 made it to the the next round, Gambin failed to make the cut as he finished 46th overall from 64 swimmers.
With Malta's participation in the pool coming to a close yesterday, it is now the turn of track and field sprinters Charlene Attard and Nikolai Portelli to make their showing in Beijing.
Attard will be involved in tomorrow's 100m heats where she will be looking to improve the national record of 11.93 seconds she set over the distance during last year's Games of the Small States of Europe in Monaco.
Portelli will be the last Maltese athlete in action in the Chinese capital. On Sunday he takes part in the 200m heats.
Meanwhile, shooter William Chetcuti was yesterday presented with a Maltese Olympic Committee diploma for placing eighth in the double trap competition earlier this week.
The presentation in Beijing was made by Maltese Olympic Committee president Lino Farrugia Sacco in the presence of secretary general Joseph Cassar, chef de mission Julian Pace Bonello and other MOC officials, athletes and coaches forming part of Team Malta.
The MOC said the diploma was the coronation of the efforts made by Chetcuti, his family, the shooting federation and the MOC.
The MOC added Chetcuti, an IOC Solidarity scholarship Athlete, was all smiles at the Athletes Village and managed to forget his disappointment at not obtaining an even better result in the competition. He is expected back in Malta this afternoon.