Great Britain win 26 medals at European Swimming Championships to top medal table in Budapest; Kathleen Dawson breaks British and European records in 4x100m medley final
Sunday 23 May 2021 22:37, UK
Kathleen Dawson broke the British and European record on her opening leg of the women's 4x100m final as Great Britain topped the medal table at the European Swimming Championships.
Great Britain secured their best showing at the event with two more golds on the final day.
A pair of medley relay golds made it 26 medals in total in Budapest, with 11 of them the top prize, at the conclusion of the competition on Sunday evening.
With the men's 4x100m medley winning earlier in the day with a time of 3:28:29 minutes, beating their old record in the championship by nearly two seconds, the women's 4x100m medley team backed it up to triumph in the last race in Hungary.
Dawson told BritishSwimming.com: "It's great to finally get it, especially here.
"It's amazing seeing the British team doing so well - it was amazing seeing Cassie (Wild) and then the boys win tonight, that really lit a fire under me so I think I knew I was going to make it."
After Dawson's strong start, European 200m breaststroke champion Molly Renshaw extended the advantage before Laura Stephens and Anna Hopkin finished off the job with a time of 3:54:01 to take Russia's championship record.
Renshaw added: "In general, the whole week, GB have just been smashing it. The relays especially have done so well and won so many golds.
"Coming into this and watching the boys in the call room win gold, we were just so pumped behind the scenes.
"We knew that if we were all swimming best times, we could be up there on top of the podium. It's nice that we all delivered and Kat got a European record, so it's amazing, we're really happy."
Luke Greenbank, Adam Peaty, James Guy and Duncan Scott joined forces for the men's 4x100 medley and the success was not limited to the medley relays.
Cassie Wild impressed to take silver in the women's 200m backstroke final with a new personal best of 2:07:74 to claim a podium at her maiden European Championships.
Ben Proud was also second in the men's 50m freestyle final while Guy clinched bronze in the men's 100m butterfly final.
Sky Scholar Max Litchfield was another to claim a third place, this time in the 400m individual medley, after a fine finish during the last leg.
It meant GB added nine silvers and six bronzes to their 11 golds to end with 26 medals, which edged out Russia and Italy in the standings.
