Ellen Walshe would have been delighted with one medley title ever at European Championships in Paris. Well, imagine how she feels, then,. now she's got two: in 2:09.81, the Irish all-rounder claimed the 200m crown from outside lane 1 atop a podium of outside smokers.

Silver was won in lane 7, by Anita Gasatldi, of Italy, the bronze in lane 8 by Roos Vanotterdijk, of Belgium, the favoured who made the centre lanes 3, 4 and 5, respectively 6th, 4th and 8th, silver to last all done on in a 0.92sec range, every swimmer on 2:10:

Templeogue's Walshe, who would leave the medley fray to dry down in readiness for the 200m butterfly less than an hour later (and succeed in qualifying for the final win curtain-0closing day tomorrow) moved through the field with confidence, turning seventh after 'fly, sixth after backstroke, fifth after breaststroke - the field a blanket with barely a head sticking out.

Off the last turn, Walshe repeated the streamlined drive off the wall to emerge with a tangible chance of being described to be level and in with a shout. A scream home followed, her 30.33 on freestyle one of only two sub-31s , the other belonging to Gastaldi, 0.02sec inside the mark to rise from fourth at the last turn to silver, leaving the bronze to Vanotterdijk, who locked Britain's Abbie Wood out by 0.17sec. The final included two 2:08+ swimmers, and several 2:09 swimmers, yet, only Walshe dipped below 2:10.

And that meant she had golf and a new Irish record in her grip, her 2:10.49 from Singapore 2025 now her second best.

Walshe said she's found herself in the sweet spot when it came to being in an outside lane:

"I think the middle lanes personally for me can be quite distracting because I'm like she's there and she's there, I knew diving in I was going to have to do my own thing here because you can't see anyone and they can't see you. I knew coming off that last wall I was going to have to do at least 14 metres underwater and try to get myself back up and just go for it.

"I just stuck to my own race plan, stayed really calm on the breaststroke, which sometimes I do tend to rush it and add a number of strokes, and just feel it under pressure, it all worked out tonight.’‘When you turn to look at people, it is that millisecond that could be on the wall and that was exactly second, third, and fourth all down the line tonight.

"I tried to stay super focused and calm on the breaststroke and then on the freestyle, I was like, I don't know where anyone is, I can't see them, until a little bit at the end I saw it was head-to-head with a couple of the girls on the line."

She had to run from the medal ceremony to the call room for the 200 'fly semis while searching for her missing cap and goggles. She said:

"That's just racing under pressure, and sometimes that works because you haven't got time to think about it, just get up and go. I’m delighted to be into the final tomorrow, hopefully I recover well and I'm able to put something solid on the board tomorrow. It's going to hurt!"

The History File below ...