Great Britain came out on top in a fantastic fight for gold in the Mixed 4x200m Freestyle Relay to cap another successful night at the European Aquatics Championships in Italy.
It was the third podium-topping performance at Rome’s Foro Italico Sports Complex for the British team, who have now claimed 13 medals in total with one day of the swimming competition still to go.
The team of Tom Dean, Matt Richards, Grantham’s Freya Colbert and Freya Anderson clocked 7:28.16 to finish 1.09 seconds ahead of France.
Olympic champion Dean got the British team off to a flying start as he touched in 1:46.15 to give Richards a body-length lead as he took over for the second leg.
Richards, who was part of Team GB’s Men’s 4x200m Freestyle gold-medal winning team at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, produced another good swim and had built up a 1.10 second advantage for former KGGS pupil Colbert.
She was being chased down by France’s Charlotte Bonnet and found herself trailing with 100m of her leg to go.
However, Colbert produced an excellent second half of her swim to regain the lead as Anderson dived in.
With 50m of the race to go, France held a slender 0.04 lead but Anderson stormed home to claim an impressive victory and successfully defend the title they won at last year’s European Championships.
This is Freya’s second medal of the championships, having won a bronze l in the Women’s 400m Individual Medley at the weekend.
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