More medal joy for the Brits in Helsinki

Karley Mann took the team’s second gold medal of the Championships earlier today in the Girls' 200m Backstroke.

The Hillingdon swimmer was led by Ukraine’s Daryna Zevina for much of the race, but in the final 50m Mann dug deep to pull off a title-winning performance touching in a new personal best of 2:11.48.

Zevina took silver in 2:11.82 with bronze going to Sweden’s Henrietta Stenkvist in 2:13.38.

"I saw the scoreboard as I came out of the final turn and knew I had to work hard as I was in second,” said Mann. “I've been focusing on improving my underwater work in training and my fitness paid off."

Britain’s Georgia Hohmann placed fourth in a new personal best of 2.14.57.

The Girls' 200m Butterfly saw Rachael Kelly win a silver medal behind Spain’s Judit Ignacio Sorribes.

Kelly was lying in fourth place after the first 100m but pulled it back to finish on the podium in a personal best time of 2:13.43, with gold being won in 2:12.30.

“I’m surprised by that performance,” said Kelly. It’s my weaker event and I only approached this as a warm up for my 100m and 50m races but I've pulled it out of the bag. I'll just go for it in the days to come."

Her coach Nathan Hilton, who is with her in Helsinki, couldn't hide his delight: "I'm over the moon. Two weeks ago she was nowhere near a medal and she's torn the race apart.”

Silver was secured by the Girls' 4x100m Freestyle Relay team as they raced to a second place finish behind the Germans. Emma Saunders, Jessica Lloyd, Sophie Smith and Sara Hamilton touched in 3:46.60.

Earlier in the session Emma Saunders and Sara Hamilton just missed out on the medals after finishing fourth and fifth respectively in the Girls' 100m Freestyle final.

The pair found themselves beaten to the finish line with just over three tenths of a second separating silver and fourth position.

Their times of 56.62 and 56.75 were not enough to overcome the speed of Silke Lippok (Germany) who took gold in 55.31. France’s Mathilde Cini and Alizee Merdi claimed silver and bronze.

Jack Burnell finished in fourth place in the Boys' 1,500m final after a strong performance. The Lincoln Vulcans swimmer broke his personal best to touch in 15:34.70 behind Ukraine’s Sergiy Frolov (15: 20.57), Belgium’s Ward Bauwens (15:27.04) and Turkey’s Ediz Yildirimer (15:31.07).

David Gregory finished seventh in the Boys' 100m Backstroke with a time of 57.18 and the Girls' 400m Freestyle saw Fiona Donnelley finish ninth in 4:22.00.

James Disney-May and James Young followed up yesterday’s medal winning relay performance by qualifying for the final of the Boys' 100m Freestyle with times of 50.91 and 51.08.

Ieuan Lloyd heads into the final of the Boys' 200m Individual Medley with the second fastest qualifying time (2:03.26). He will be joined by Dan Wallace, whose 2:04.36 was enough to qualify him for the final 10 in sixth place.

Cameron Brodie made it through to the final of the Boys' 200m Butterfly sixth fastest touching in 2:01.41 in his semi-final.

Current medal tally:
Gold
Sophie Smith – Girls' 400m Individual Medley
Karley Mann – Girls' 200m Backstroke

Silver
Rachael Kelly – Girls' 200m Butterfly
Boys' 4x100m Freestyle Relay
Girls' 4x100m Freestyle Relay

Bronze
Alfie Howes – Boys' 400m Freestyle
Sara Lougher – Girls' 50m Breaststroke