Heading into the weekend finals Great Britain’s junior team has taken to the podium seven times in Otopeni at the European Junior Swimming Championships.
Three relay medals have accompanied individual success for Jonathon Marshall, Jacob Whittle, Evie Dillie and George Smith as the British junior team competed across the first four days of action in Romania.
A silver medal on day one started the ball rolling with the Men's 4x100m Freestyle quartet in an enthralling battle against the host nation’s foursome. Whittle led out the team at great pace to stay within contact of an explosive start from the recently crowned double world champion Popovici (ROU) in the neighbouring lane, before handing over to Alexander Painter and Evan Jones who took Great Britain into a slender lead at the final changeover. Reuben Rowbotham-Keating was tasked with anchoring the team home and came close to holding off the fast finishing Dinu (ROU) but was edged into silver by 0.08 seconds.
Calvin Fry was also awarded a silver medal for his part in helping the team qualify out the preliminaries as the second fastest seed, whilst in the Women’s equivalent Eva Okaro, Darcey Revitt, Hollie Widdows and Erin Little placed just outside the podium positions in fourth.
Whittle then added an individual Men’s 200m Freestyle bronze to his name on Wednesday afternoon - the Loughborough Performance Centre athlete producing a personal best swim of 1:47.85 over the distance, with relay teammate Jones finishing seventh overall in the final.
The Men’s 50m Backstroke delivered more excitement on day two with Jonathon Marshall sprinting to silver in the one length showdown. Marshall was on top form to touch in 25.21, getting in ahead of a nip-and-tuck finish for the final podium spot which saw fellow Brit Matthew Ward finish just 0.06 off the bronze in sixth.
Marshall doubled up his medal haul in leading off the Mixed 4x100m Medley quartet to a silver medal. The FAST club swimmer handed over to Elliot Woodburn - a finalist in the 50m Breaststroke earlier in the championships – before Hollie Widdows dived in for the Butterfly leg, with Erin Little bringing it home strongly as she overtook the Ukrainian quartet over the final 100m clutch the silver medal touch.
Mount Kelly’s Little has had a busy Championships in the relay anchoring role, with an agonising pair of fourths in the aforementioned Women’s 4x100m Freestyle and as part of a Mixed 4x100m Freestyle team on day two (with Whittle, Painter and Eva Okaro). However teaming up with Widdows the twenty four hours before their relay silver, the pair bookended a bronze medal winning Women’s 4x200m Freestyle quartet performance - Emma Croker and Ashleigh Baillie provided impressive swims in the middle portion of the race as they fended off the challenge of the Spanish in the closing race of the day three schedule.
Back to the individual efforts, a fast finish for George Smith saw him claim European junior bronze in the Men’s 200m Breaststroke. Having turned dead level in 4th at 150m with fellow Brit Harvey Freeman, Smith produced the second quickest closing split of the entire filed to push himself up into the medal spots, with Freeman ultimately placing sixth overall.
Meanwhile a lifetime best performance from Evie Dilley secured Britain’s second bronze of Friday’s action in a tight Women’s 200m Backstroke contest against her compatriot Holly McGill. The British pair swapped places for that final podium spot between one another throughout the opening 150m, but it was the Borough of Stockton swimmer who just had the edge in the closing stages.
Elsewhere there has been positive final progressions from the burgeoning British swimming talent competing in Romania, with Alexander Painter and Eva Okaro finishing 5th and 6th in their respective Men’s and Women’s 50m Freestyle showdowns, whilst Sienna Robinson (5th) and Charlotte Bianchi (8th) provided strong representation in the Women’s 200m Breaststroke, as did Kaden Edwards (7th) and Evan Jones (8th) in the Men’s 400m Individual Medley.
Find full event results from the championships here, with heats (8am) and finals (3pm) streamed daily at via LEN TV.