Canada's gold medalist Brent Hayden wears his gold medal as he gestures on the podium after winning gold in the men's 50m freestyle final during the Commonwealth Games at the Dr. S.P. Mukherjee Aquatics Center in New Delhi, India, Saturday, Oct. 9, 2010. (AP Photo/Victor R. Caivano)Victor R. Caivano/The Associated Press
Brent Hayden completed a sweep of the freestyle sprints Saturday by taking top spot in the 50 metres, one of three gold medals for Canada on Saturday in the Commonwealth Games pool.
Hayden, of Mission, B.C., finished in 22.01 seconds to beat defending champion and three-time Olympian Roland Schoeman of South Africa on the final night of the six-day meet.
"To win two gold medals here is huge for me," said Hayden. "I came here only looking at gold and when you set high standards for yourself and you achieve it, it is such a rewarding feeling.
"I didn't have my best 50 tonight. I was a little more nervous than usual, but it was a solid performance."
Ryan Cochrane of Victoria won his second gold of the Games with a victory in the 1,500 metres and Benoit Huot of Longueuil, Que., won gold in the 100-metre freestyle S10.
Cochrane finished first in 15 minutes 01.49 seconds. Heerden Herman of South Africa was just over two seconds back and Daniel Fogg of England won the bronze.
Cochrane, who won Olympic bronze in the 1,500 at the Beijing Games, won gold in the 400 freestyle on Day 1 in New Delhi.
"I'm happy to be on top of the podium again," Cochrane said. "It was great to be pushed like that today."
Huot posted a Games-record time of 53.70 seconds in his race, finishing over a second ahead of Andrew Pasterfield of Australia.
"I won the bronze in 2002, the silver in 2006 so I definitely wanted the gold this year," said Huot, recapping his Commonwealth Games history. "This is something I had been thinking about for a year."
England's Robert Welbourn won the bronze.
Audrey Lacroix of Pont-Rouge, Que., won two medals on the day. She took the silver in the women's 200 butterfly and added a bronze in the 4x100 medley relay with Julia Wilkinson of Stratford, Ont., Annamay Pierse of Edmonton and Victoria Poon of Montreal.
The big winner in the gold category was Australia, which won four more Saturday to move to 22 for the meet. Jessicah Schipper and Brenton Rickard won individual races and Australian teams won both 4x100 relays.
Record-equalling swimmer Leisel Jones swam the breaststroke leg for the Australian team and the gold was the 10th of her Commonwealth Games career and third of this meet. The 10 career golds equals other Australian swim stars Ian Thorpe and Susie O'Neill for the most number by an individual at the Games.
Alicia Coutts swam the freestyle leg on the Australian team to win her fifth gold of the Games - three individual and two on relays.
Schipper won the 200 butterfly, finishing in two minutes, 07.04 seconds. Lacroix was second and Ellen Gandy of England was third.
"That was a tough last 25 metres, but I knew I had already done the hard work and I was able to hold on," said Schipper.
Lacroix pushed hard on the final lap but couldn't catch the defending champion.
"I was going for the win but it's still a nice result," said Lacroix. "I didn't have a great season overall so it's encouraging to finish that way."
MacKenzie Downing of Whitehorse was sixth.
Rickard won the 200 breaststroke, finishing ahead of Michael Jamieson of Scotland and Australia's Christian Sprenger.
Hannah Miley of Scotland won the 400 individual medley, with Samantha Hamill of Australia second and Keri-Ann Payne of England third. Stephanie Rice of Australia, the Olympic champion in both the 200 and 400 IM, did not compete in New Delhi due to recent shoulder surgery.
Natalie du Toit of South Africa won the Paralympic 100 butterfly S9. One of the biggest cheers of the night was for Kiran Tak of India, who finished the race more than 45 seconds after du Toit touched the wall.
The Canadian team of Hayden, Tobias Oriwol of Pointe-Claire, Que., Scott Dickens of Burlington, Ont., and Stefan Hirniak of Victoria finished fourth in the men's 4x100 medley relay. South Africa won silver and England was third.
Meanwhile, Games officials Saturday sought to clarify quotes from Schoeman during Friday's session which they say were incorrectly reported by some media.
In response to crowd noise that saw him nearly disqualified from a race, Schoeman told Australia's Ten Network that it was an "absolute disgrace" that some spectators were allowed to make so much noise at the start.
"There's a guy in the stands just shouting, shouting, shouting," the organizing committee said in a statement. "Someone like that needs to be ejected from this place. It's unacceptable to be at a professional event like this and have the stand and have people going on like monkeys."
Despite his comments, Schoeman was greeted with warm applause and no boos when he was presented with his silver medal Saturday.
Schoeman said after the medal ceremony that he was unhappy with the way the "monkey" remark was interpreted.
"I'm disappointed in the way the Australian media portrayed what I said," he said. "It wasn't meant to be a racist remark - in South Africa when someone calls you a monkey they mean hooligan. The comment was aimed at only one individual who was acting like a hooligan."
With files from The Associated Press