Filip Nowacki, who claimed four gold medals at European Junior Championships and broke Adam Peaty's 100m British junior recording the 100m breaststroke in the bargain, claimed the World Junior title in the event with a third national youth mark this evening.

Racing on day 2 at the global youth showcase in Otopeni, Romania, Nowacki, 17, clocked 59.20 for the crown ahead of a 59.50 from Shin Ohashi, the Japanese teen who took down the World junior record in 58.94 in Tokyo last month, Britain granted a second bite of the podium by Max Morgan, in 59.93.

Fourth at the turn in 28.10, Nowacki past Morgan (27.41), Ohashi (27.70) and Germany's Jan Grafe (27.79) down the homeward length, his 31.10 finish a class apart.

The winning time was just 0.19sec shy of the championship record held;during since 2017 by Italy's Nicolo Martinenghi, the Paris 2024 Olympic champion 0.02sec ahead of Peaty in one of the oddest outcomes on the clock in the history of the event.

The Otopeni Final:

Nowacki, who set as 200m European junior championship for gold and the breaststroke double last month, followed up with eight gold medals at the Island Games a week later.

Now, the 17-year-old from Jersey is a World Junior champion. In the 200m this week, Nowacki, coached by Kieron Piper at Millfield, will face Ohashi once more, and again, the Japaneses challenger will enter the fray as World youth standards holder after clocking 2:07.27 at High School Championships in Osaka.

In Slovakia at European Junior champs last month, Nowacki clocked a continental youth champs standard of 2:09.11 in the semi-final and reduced it to 2:08.32 in the final for his second solo gold of the meet.

He'd struck gold for the first time in the 100m when taking down Peaty's British junior standard in 59.59sec. Peaty had held the record since 2013, the year before his own big breakthrough with golds at European and Commonwealth senior levels. In semi-finals in Romania yesterday, Nowacki shaved the British junior standard back to 59.30.

Having also helped Britain claim golds in the men's 4x100m medley and mixed 4x100 medley at the continental event in Samorin, he then amassed eight gold medals at the Island Games, a short-course meet held in Orkney. He twice smashed the Island Games record to win the 200m breaststroke on the last day of action, shaving 4.5sec off the mark in heats and then lowering it to 2:05.89 for gold 13 seconds ahead of Guernsey teammate Oscar Dodds, who took silver.

The breaststroke standard had been held since 2015 by a man much better known for his distance freestyle exploits: Faroe Islands and Denmark Olympian Pal Joensen.

Nowacki's home coach since the swimmer was 11, Nathan Jegou told BBC Radio Jersey at the close of the Island Games, that his charge was 'very unassuming':

"He comes here, he performs well, but you wouldn't know he's at the level he's at, he sort of just mucks in with everyone. He's very unassuming, dedicates himself to being the best sportsman he can be and we're proud to have him with us. He's put himself on the map. He's top 10 in the world probably at the moment. Peak male performance is not until your mid-20s, he's 17, so he's in no rush and we keep trying to tell him that."

Jegou persuaded Nowacki and his family that the talented teen should make a move to Millfield to access world-class coaching ands facilities in a place where study and sport go hand in hand. 

Other winners on day 2 included Carlos D'Ambrosio, who took down local hero and Olympic champion David Popovici's World junior record from 2022 in the 200m freestyle with a 1:45.15 victory:

Other Finals & Semis In Full - Otopeni, Day 2:

• RESULTS IN FULL
• Finals at a Glance:

Also in the August Vortex:

• At 12, Yu Zidi, 3x4th & Bronze Medallist At Global Seniors, Too Young To Race As World Juniors Begin
• World Cup Rosters Include McIntosh, McKeown, Douglass, O'Callaghan, Smith, Ponti, Kós, Ceccon, Liendo - and Peaty