Siobhan-Marie O’Connor became the first British female to win an Olympic medal in the 200m individual medley after surging to the first of two Team GB silver medals in the pool on day four of Rio 2016.
O’Connor smashed her own British record to 2:06.88 minutes to secure her name in the history books and grab Team GB’s fifth medal of the Games and third in the pool.
The 20-year-old, from Bath, faced a tough task to get her hands on gold with Katinka Hosszu just out of reach, the Hungarian winning her third gold of Rio 2016.
After she claimed her Olympic medal O’Connor said, ““It is an absolutely amazing feeling. I have had probably the most consistent block of work that I have ever had leading up to this.
“I was really confident coming into it because sometimes I can have disruptions. I felt in a really good place. My team have just been amazing at keeping me fit and health and in training. It is brilliant and I am over the moon with that result.
“I was pretty nervous in the call room. I just knew I had to try and stick to how I swim the race best. In the past sometimes I have gone out too hard and tried to really sit with Katinka and I haven’t had a finish.
“I just had to swim it how I know best and when I turned on the breaststroke I was surprised I was quite close. When I looked around and saw the time I was over the moon because I didn’t think I had that time in me and I am really pleased to have pushed her as hard as I could.
“It is amazing to be a part of it this team. This is such a brilliant performance, we are just on an absolute roll this week and I am just so proud to be part of the team.
“We have had a good few years and changed a lot and we have got some amazing swimmers on our team. Our staff and our coaches and our support team are absolutely incredible, they have done everything for us and we are so well prepared, we have come into this met with a lot of confidence.”
Moments later the British men’s 4x200m freestyle relay team took a dramatic silver and secured the fourth GB medal in the pool of the games.
In the heats the quartet of Stephen Milne, Robbie Renwick, Daniel Wallace and Duncan Scott secured the all-important finals berth and they came into the event as World champions.
Men’s 200m Freestyle World champion James Guy was brought into the team for the final and brought the team home to victory on the final leg of the race.
A courageous swim by the team saw them progress through the rankings during the race, they passed the team from Australia and Japan and put themselves in the silver medal spot.
Only the team from the USA beat the brits to the touch and took gold, bronze went to Japan.
The medal win immediately followed Siobhan-Marie O’Connor’s 200m individual medley silver to ensure Team GB will have its most successful Olympic Games in the pool since Los Angeles 1984.
The two silvers take Britain’s swimming tally at Rio 2016 to four, following Adam Peaty and Jazz Carlin’s gold and silver success on Sunday.
Guy who secured the medal for GB said after the race, “I've got faster and faster the more I've been racing. The team is young and we'll be ready for the title at Tokyo 2020."
Milne added: "I can't believe it. These guys were amazing and it was a real honour to swim with them."
Also in action on day of the swimming in Rio was Andrew Willis and Craig Benson in the semi-finals of the Men’s 200m Breaststroke.
Willis continued to demonstrate his form as he qualified second fastest for tomorrows Olympic final with a new lifetime best of 2:07.73. Benson was placed 13th on the final rankings. and narrowly missed out on progressing to the next round of the event.
Relay silver medallist, Duncan Scott also went in the semi-finals of the Men’s 100m Freestyle. After a hugely successful heats swim which saw him set a new British record of 48.01. He posted a time in the semi to place himself seventh fastest for tomorrow’s Olympic final.