Competing at his eighth world championships, 35-year-old Leslie opened his campaign in the men’s 100m freestyle S4.
Leslie executed a good dive in the final and got into his fast stroke rate to be alongside the leaders through the opening 25m before they pulled away.
Sitting in sixth at halfway, Leslie was in a close tussle with Gustavo Ramon Sanchez Martinez through the dying stages, Leslie (1min 30.78sec) narrowly getting to the wall ahead by 0.01sec to place sixth.
Ami Omer Dadaon, of Israel, claimed the gold medal ahead of Italian Cristiani Federico and Angel de Jesus Camacho Ramirez, of Mexico.
Smith was also in action, returning to the pool after her silver medal-winning performance on the opening day.
The 19-year-old raced the women’s 200m individual medley SM10 from lane one.
Smith got away from the blocks well to start the butterfly leg.
She used her form in the breaststroke to bridge the gap to those ahead and finished strongly in the freestyle to achieve the third-best time of her career of 2min 40.00sec and finish eighth.
There was a battle throughout for the gold with outside flier Defne Kurt, of Turkey, impressing with a late surge to cap off an impressive display to win gold in 2min 28.30sec.
Faye Rogers, of Great Britain, was narrowly back in lane four to claim the silver and Lisa Kruger, of the Netherlands, had a strong second half to secure bronze. — Allied Media
