New records as Chetcuti takes bronze in 50m free

Andrew Chetcuti grabbed his second medal in the LieGames when he placed third in the 50m freestyle in record time in Muhleholz, yesterday.

Other notable performances at the pool from the Maltese team came from Nicola Muscat, in the 50m free, and the men’s 4x100 IM quartet. Both placed fourth in their respective finals, setting new national bests on the way.

But it was Chetcuti, again, who drew the plaudits as he powered to third place in the 50m dash in 23.67 seconds. That timing was 0.06 seconds faster than the previous Malta record which belonged to Ryan Gambin since June 2008.

Iceland’s Arni Mar Arnason took gold in the one lap race in 23.17 while Alexandre Bakhtiatov, of Cyprus, was second in 23.25.

In the women’s freestyle sprint, Muscat came agonisingly close to winning her first individual medal in Liechtenstein when she clocked 26.87 and finished behind San Marino swimmer Tini Clelia who placed third in 26.73.

A consolation for Muscat was the fact that her performance was a new national best as she trimmed 0.20 seconds off the previous record of 26.93 she herself had established in April this year.

In the 4x100 IM, Mark Sammut, Andrea Agius, Chetcuti and Neil Agius also set a new national record, touching home in 4:00.50... almost five seconds faster than the previous best mark of 4:05.43.

Iceland took gold in 3:48.14 with Luxembourg placing second in 3:52.96 and Monaco third in 3:57.59.

In the women’s relay, Muscat, Talisa Pace, Melinda Sue Micallef and Davina Mangion finished a distant fifth place in 4:39.86. Cyprus took gold in 4:18.94.

The other Maltese swimmer in action yesterday was Edward Caruana Dingli. He placed sixth in the 200m free when clocking 2:00.25.

Luxembourg’s Raphael Stacchioti won the race in 1:54.06.

Malta coach Andy Colbourn was again a satisfied man with the results obtained by his swimmers and wants the team to repeat their fine performances in today’s last races at the LieGames pool.

“There are a lot of positives to take from today,” Colbourn said.

“Andrew was superb in the 50m free and the boys’ relay team and Nicola Muscat were just outside the medals’ zone after setting new national bests in their respective races,” he said.

“So far, we have already improved on Cyprus 2009 but we can still do better here and target other podium placings in the freestyle relays.”