Pieter Coetzé won the 200m backstroke at the final third leg of the World Cup in Astana, Kazakhstan, on Friday, to briefly take the lead as the top male swimmer of the series.

The 22-year-old touched in 1min 48.08sec to finish a body length ahead of American Shaine Casas in 1:49.48 for a clean sweep of victories in this event.

Coetzé, who claimed the 100m backstroke treble on Thursday, will aim to make it a hattrick of hattricks on Saturday in the 50m backstroke, the event in which he broke the world record in Tashkent last week.

His win on Friday took his points tally to 153.3, overhauling Russian Egor Kornev on 151.4.

But by the end of the session Coetzé was back to second, overhauled by American Luke Barr on 161.6, with Casas third on 151.5.

Coetzé has only the one race on Saturday, the final day, but he admitted his body is feeling the toll of three weeks of racing.

If he can finish the final session atop the standings he will join countrymen Ryk Neething, Cameron van der Burgh, Chad Le Clos and Matthew Sates as a World Cup series winner.

“It’s been a lot of fun, but I’m starting to feel it now,” said Coetzé, who hadn’t raced short-course in two years before the first World Cup gala at the start of the month.

Matthew Caldwell ended fourth in the men’s 400m freestyle in 3:40.54, just two-hundredths of a second behind third-placed Oliver Papai of Hungary.

Rebecca Meder also narrowly missed out on the podium, touching in 58.72 in the women’s 100m individual medley, just 0.04 behind British bronze medallist Abbie Wood.

A little later she ended fifth in the women’s 200m breaststroke in 2:20.83, within half-a-second of the next three rivals ahead of her. Russia’s Evgeniia Chikunova was the run-away victor in 2:16.57.

And breaststroke sprint specialist Michael Houlie finished 10th in the men’s 100m individual medley in 54.95.