Cesar Cielo Sprint Fly King Yet Again

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BARCELONA, Spain, July 29. EVEN a knee injury couldn’t stop Brazil’s Cesar Cielo from getting the chance to celebrate a world title mightily, this time when he successfully defended his men’s 50-meter fly crown at the FINA World Championships.

Cielo splash-and-dashed his way to a 23.01 as he clipped USA’s Eugene Godsoe (23.05) at the wall for the title. The win made Cielo the second man to ever claim the sprint fly title twice since its inception at the 2001 World Championships, where Geoff Huegill triumphed in 23.50. Roland Schoeman went back-to-back in 2005 and 2007 in the event, but had a tough time making it through semis this year as he continues retooling his career.

Cielo’s winning time wasn’t among the fastest in the event, hovering around the 20s on the all-time charts, but the win is all the matters to the Olympic champion as he continues to make some changes to his training regimen with a focus on being at the 2016 Rio Olympics.

Godsoe, meanwhile, went from having never been on an international team for the Stars and Stripes to now owning a Worlds medal. That’s a strong summer so far for the Stanford volunteer assistant coach. France’s Fred Bousquet captured bronze in the event with a 23.11 to round out the podium.

Brazil’s Nicholas Santos (23.21), Ukraine’s Andrii Govorov (23.22), Belarus’ Yauhen Tsurkin (23.28), Germany’s Steffen Deibler (23.28) and France’s Florent Manaudou (23.35) finished fourth through eighth in the swift championship finale.

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