The 2009 FINA Swimming World Cup will come to a close this upcoming weekend in Singapore. The meet, which kicks off on Saturday, will be the final in determining who will be the winners of the purse that will give $100,000 to the male and female winners, $50,000 to the second place finishers, and $30,000 to the third place finishers.

This year’s World Cup has been one of the more exciting on record, and has included appearances by international superstars Michael Phelps, Leisel Jones, Jessica Hardy, Cameron van der Burgh, and Paul Biedermann.

The series finale will get one more participant this weekend in the form of American Ian Crocker. Crocker, who swam collegiately at the University of Texas, has held the World Record in each of the 4 shorter butterfly events (100 SCM & LCM; 50 SCM & LCM) and is a three time Olympic Champion.

Thus far, there have been 20 World Records set on the women’s side by 11 different swimmers and 14 on the men’s side by 10 different swimmers. This is a huge jump from last year’s World Cup, when there were only 12 World Records set; 10 men’s and 2 women’s.

Technically, no swimmer is eliminated. If, say, a swimmer were to swim 5 events, and set a World Record in the prelims and finals of each event, they would likely contend for a top 3 finish. Additionally, the World Cup points awarded for the top 10 finishers are doubled. In reality, however, the meet is down to just a handful of swimmers with the chance to win.

On the women’s side, American Jessica Hardy has jumped out to a commanding lead with 170 points. Therese Alshammar of Sweden is in second with 130 points. Those two women are responsible for being the leading point earners at every meet so far and have set 7 World Records.

Marieke Guehrer of Australia is currently in the poll position for 3rd place with 79 points but is followed close behind by Zhao Zing of China with 76. Zing has only scored in one meet this year, where she received a boost from three World Record swims. With good performances, Shiho Sakai of China (60 points), Hinkelien Schreuder of the Netherlands (58 points) and Liesel Jones of Australia (57 points) could sneak into the money.

The men’s standings are topped by 2 South Africans, with Cameron van der Burgh firmly in control with 131 points. Roland Schoeman is in second with 81. Schoeman has shown impressive consistency by remaining in second place despite being the only man in the top 11 of the overall standings who has not broken a World Record. One point behind Schoeman, with 80, is American Peter Marshall. These three men are strong favorites to remain at the top, in some order, after the Singapore meet, as the next closest competitor is Evgeny Korotyshkin of Russia with 58 points, 40 of which have come from World Records.

German Paul Biedermann, who is currently in 5th with 50 points, has probably the best chance to move into the top 3 if he has another strong performance in Singapore like he did in Berlin. Biedermann, in his first meet back after a thigh injury, set 2 World Records and was the 5th highest scorer of that meet.

Singapore looks to be an exciting finish to an exciting series. To think that at the Durban stop, National Records were worthy of mentioning, and now it takes no less than a World Cup Record, if not more, to garner any significant attention.