France hold off Russia to win swimming relay gold
France continued their dominance of the men’s 4x100 metre freestyle relay event at the world championship after they beat Russia to win the gold medal at Kazan on Sunday.
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The French quartet of Mehdy Metella, Florent Manaudou, Fabien Gilot and Jeremy Stravius clocked three minutes, 10.74 seconds to beat the Russian team by just 0.45 seconds.
Italy finished third around 1.8 seconds behind.
What made the French achievement even more special was the fact that they were without 200-metre freestyle world and Olympic champion Yannick Agnel.
Agnel had won the 200 metre event and was a part of the gold medal winning team that won the 4x100 metre freestyle event at the 2013 World Championship in Barcelona.
With this win, France now have two gold medals in the championship and are placed in fifth place.
Swimming powerhouse China leads the overall standings with 11 golds followed by Russia and the US which have won eight and four gold medals respectively.
Meanwhile, American sensation Katie Ledecky broke her own 1,500 metre freestyle record in the heats on Monday.
The 18-year-old, who also holds the 400 metre and 800 metre freestyle world records, clocked 15 minutes, 27.71 seconds to beat her own time of 15:28.36 seconds which she had set at the Pan-Pacific Games in August 2014.
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