Swimming news - Adam Peaty leads medal charge for Great Britain at European Championships in Budapesst

Great Britain were top of the European Swimming Championships medal table with only one more of the day’s competition to go.

The team won five more medals on Saturday night, with Adam Peaty taking gold at in Budapest, before Anna Hopkin and Abbie Wood both claimed medals, as well as Luke Greenbank taking silver in the backstroke, followed by success with the 4 x 100m freestyle relay.

Peaty won in lane four of the men’s 50m breaststroke winning by half a length.

After the race, he said: “It was almost perfect execution there. It’s looking very promising if I can do that in a 50m with where I’m at right now. I really just wanted that win and that’s what it’s all about – finding a win when you can’t get your best - it was just about getting my hand on the wall first. It’s a great feeling and I’m born to race.”

The Great Britain team then secured the 4 x 100m freestyle relay with Duncan Scott, Tom Dean, Anna Hopkin and Freya Anderson getting the job done.

Of her anchor leg, Anderson said: “What was going through my head was just to keep building on the success the relays have had. I think all the relays with girls in have won gold, so I didn’t want to let that statistic down!”

Scott added: “We just had to do our part and then the ladies in the back half of our relay are some of the best in the world. If we do our job correctly, it puts us in a really good position. I think we did that and then Freya hunted some people down like usual.

“It was great to be part of that relay, it's my first gold of the meet so I'm really happy with that.”

In the women’s 200m individual medley final, Wood managed to take silver, 0.04 seconds short of gold.

“Racing in a senior final is completely different to anything I’ve done before and that’s my first individual senior medal. Just to be to do that and produce a good time on an international stage is all I’ve wanted, especially when we’re not as rested as we could be – I couldn’t have asked for much more,” she said.

“Kicking off the week with three relay swims, which I didn’t really expect because I’m not a freestyler – but I guess now I am – to then focus on the individuals has been a hard turnaround. But with this back-to-back swimming, it will make Tokyo seem so easy when I’ve only got one swim per session – to double up last night is probably the biggest learning experience I could have got.”

There was also European silver for Greenbank, who led at halfway, only to be caught in the final 50 metres in the 200m backstroke, though he was able to take silver.

“If you’d have told me I’d have gone three 1:54s before this meet I’d have been over the moon! I took it out a little bit harder and suffered a bit towards the back end. But if you’d told me I was going to do that coming in, I’d have been over the moon.”

Hopkin then took bronze in the women’s 100m freestyle final to complete an excellent haul for Great Britain.

Hopkin said: “I’m so happy. I had in the back of my mind that a medal could be possible, but I didn’t want to think about it too much. I saw the time first, and I was really happy with that as it’s faster than I did at trials and then I saw the place! This week has been a real confidence boost and I think I’ve built nicely through the week too. After doing such good splits in the relays, I really wanted to do the same in the individual and do myself justice, so I’m glad I managed to do that.”