Angharad Evans arrived at her blocks for the 200m breaststroke final to face the World record holder with a spring in her step but only one experience of ever having raced inside 2mins 20.

Evgenia Chikunova had done it four times, and tonight, the world-record holder with a 2:17.55 on the board as global high bar from a domestic race in out-of-bounds Kazan in 2023, made it five, with not a little help from Evans.

The British breaker has had the best season of her international carer this summer, in the bag twin 100-200m Commonwealth crowns for Scotland joined by the third gold of her senior career when she hooked the European 100m title here in Paris on Wednesday.

How to tackle the 200m? Big question when up against an opponent that has been a rare presence in international competition for a while, courtesy of the Ukrainian blood on the hands of the president of her country.

Evans opted for courage and she turned to Ben Higson, her coach at the Stirling Performance Centre in Scotland, before heading to her blocks and said:

"There's no losing tonight. Either I gain more experience or I gain a medal. I ended up gaining both. So, that was probably the most painful race I've done. Going out of 1:06.5 isn't easy at all, but, the brave are usually favoured."

Here's what she meant in a showdown that ended with Chikunova with gold in 2:19.32, Evans win 2:21.21 for silver - having led to the last turn - and Mona McSharry adding bronze, in 2:22.43, to her silver behind Evans in the 200m:

The win was a vchjampiuonship record inside the 2:19.84 that had stood to Denmark's Rikke Moeller Pedersen for 12 years, since Berlin 2014.

There's bad blood in all of that:

• The Battle of Herning: At the December 2013 European Short Course Championships in Denmark, Efimova thumped Pedersen in front of her home crowd, setting a short-course world record in 2:14.39 to Pedersen’s 2:15.21. 
• The Aftermath: Shortly after, news broke that Efimova had tested positive for the banned steroid DHEA. She received a carefully crafted 16-month suspension, and her titles and records from the December 2013 short-course meet - including the times that eclipsed Pedersen - were officially stripped and invalidated. Pedersen, of course, never got to hear the adulation of the home crowd for the award she merited. Such is the consequence of doping - and generations of women have suffered the same unfair play and its fallout into life without sports authorities wising up to the damage done to athletes... for example...
• While Pedersen maintained her status as the long-course world record holder in the 200m breaststroke for a decade, Efimova returned from her suspension to win subsequent global medals through the 2016 Rio Olympics and 2019 World Championships. And in 2026, she's here in Paris as a 'neutral' but far from the kind of form that one might imagine would merit selection.
• World Aquatics, blind to all of that and much more, will allow neutral B back in with full national identity, strip and flag from September, without any of the immense harm done and ongoing, without any of the hurt it causes Ukrainians, taken into consideration, nor with any sense of deeper understanding when it comes to sport and politics and what happens at the interface of both when politics holds power over sport, as it most certainly has in the nation currently known as neutral B.

Meanwhile, Angharad Evans had good reason to borrow a line from Edith Piaf:  Non, Je ne regrette rien.

"It's just another step forward in my career. If I'm gonna come second, it's gonna be to the world record holder. The 200 still a new event to me. I hesitate saying that because, I've had massive drops in that event, but I'm not as experienced in it as I am the 100, and I'm still learning how to swim it.

"I swam it very bravely tonight. I absolutely went for it, and I know that a lot of the other girls can come back fast, and I just left everything on the table tonight. It's my last individual swim of the year, and I had absolutely nothing to lose. I've already earned myself the title of European Champion, which is such an honour, and I just went in tonight to just give it my all and leave everything in the pool. A silver medal at Europeans is something I've never achieved before long course."

 She'd entered the fray with a tactical disadvantage, with only one sub-2:20 under her belt, at Trials back in spring, and a determination to see if she could burn Chikunova off, kn owing that there was a price to pay if that did not work. Now she knows in plenty of time for her race plan to evolve and improve:

"Hopefully my time will be LA2028. That's what everything's focused towards. I've been 2:19 once, and before that it was a 2:21. So, you know, my first 2:20 (2:20.96 in semis) was last night. I just completely skipped over that barrier, and every race I've done at this Europeans has been 100%-in, and I've never done that before. It's usually at trials, for example, cruise the heat, go fast in the final, and every single race here has been a complete honest effort. I left everything in the pool, and that's what I did again tonight."

"I'm just so proud of myself that I turned it around from Commies [Commonwealth Games] with times and nerves. I'm slowly becoming the swimmer that I want to be, and I'm just hugely proud that that's how I ended my season."

It's one that will end with Peaty the Lion learning lessons anew, yet passing on wisdom to a growing generation of swimmers taking the British breaststroke baton and running oil with it. Evans said of the 200m champion who wished her well here last night after her semi - teammate Filip Nowacki:

"He's a very special swimmer and person, and I think he's just picking up the momentum that Peaty placed down. And the breaststroke group that we have in Great Britain right now is not one to be overlooked. The words that we pass on to each other and the momentum ... it's just such a great group, and we have such great breaststroke coaches in the UK. And I think going into LA, it's very, very exciting, both female and male."

Indeed. Evans' silver grew Britain's historic count in the event back to 1927 to 4 golds, 4 silvers and 5 bronzes, those 13 medals the biggest haul by any nation down all those years (see history file below), though the GDR and State (Secret) Research Plan 14:25 tops the table with five enhanced-effort golds.

A delighted McSharry also spoke after the race, saying:

"Again, like the last one, I think it hasn’t hit yet, I just finished the race, and I was like, all right, job done. But, you know, we're moving through the process here, and yeah, I'm happy to be back on the podium.

"I was definitely burning up on the last fifty, I could see, obviously, Evans beside me, couldn't see anything else, so I had to hang on for dear life here. I'm glad that I was on the right side of the tight finish."

After the medals ceremony, she added: "It was great, I was trying to soak it in as much as possible, because I feel like I've had times in the past where you maybe don't take it all in, so it's looking into the crowd, seeing all the Irish flags, looking at our team, it was great."

She's stood on a big podium in Paris before these championships, of course: bronze in the Olympic 100m final two years ago.

"I think Paris is a good city for me, I might just move here! I think it feels almost different because we're not in the same pool or accommodation, but it does have the same kind of feel to it and I do remember back to Paris and having my family here to support really made it feel a lot similar, it’s been great."

The history file below...