European Championships, Day Seven Finals: Nine Crowns Up for Grabs on Last Night Of Paris 2026
Nine titles are on the line as the European Championships draw to a close in Paris. The evening will begin with the men’s 50 free and conclude with the men’s medley relay after seven days of thrilling, quality racing at the Olympic Aquatic Centre.
Home favourite Leon Marchand is in the 400 free final and joins Yohann Ndoye Brouard, Carl Aitkaci and Maxime Grousset in the French medley relay where he’ll swim the fly leg.
Lukas Märtens squeaked into the 400 free final where the Olympic and world champion clinched the last spot and will be swimming from lane eight.
Apostolos Christou has won 100m backstroke medals at five straight editions starting back at London 2016 with the Greek defending his 2024 title. It’s a race packed full of quality featuring Ndoye Brouard, Thomas Ceccon and Pavel Samusenko as well as Christou to name but four.
Hugo Gonzalez set a 200IM championship record of 1:56.61 to book lane four with Duncan Scott and Hubert Kos also in the race.
Helena Rosendahl Bach attempts her 200 fly defence; German duo Maya Werner and Isabel Gose occupy the centre lanes in the women’s 400 free with Simona Quadarella on the prowl after winning the 800/1500 double; Benedetta Pilato has led throughout the rounds in the women’s 50 breast.
Great Britain lead the medal table with six golds, one ahead of Italy and two more than the Neutral Athletes.
Men’s 50 Free
A crown awaited a new dash champion with 2024 and 2022 gold medallists Kristian Gkolomeev and Ben Proud having departed for the Enhanced Games.
And it was Nikita Sheremet who got his hand to the wall first, the Ukrainian touching in 21.13 ahead of Neutral Athlete Egor Kornev who shared silver with Serbian Andrej Barna in 21.37.
While Sheremet hoisted himself on the lane ropes and slapped the water in celebration, there was no reaction from Kornev who simply swam over the lane ropes and on to poolside.
Women’s 50m Breaststroke
Benedetta Pilato led through prelims and semis and broke 30secs on both occasions.
She and Ruta Meilutyte were stroke for stroke in adjacent lanes with the Lithuanian taking the title in the narrowest of margins in 29.93 to 29.94.
Mona McSharry swam an Irish record of 29.95 for bronze as the first three home were separated by just 0.03. She leaves Paris with a medal in each of the three breaststroke events.
Men’s 200IM
Hubert Kos won the titles in 2022 and 2024 but it was Hugo Gonzalez – the 2021 champion – who’d booked lane four with a CR in the semis.
Kos went out fast and was 0.88 inside WR pace at halfway although he’d fallen almost a second outside after the breaststroke leg.
Gonzalez had made inroads into the deficit and came at Kos down the final 50 with the Hungarian digging into every last reserve to get his hand to the wall in a CR 1:54.24 to 1:54.44.
Mikhail Shcherbakov of the Neutral Athletes set a WJR of 1:56.16 for bronze.
Women’s 200 Fly
No British woman had ever won this event but Keanna MacInnes wrote a new line in history.
The University of Stirling swimmer led from start to finish to take the title in 2:05.90 ahead of reigning champion Helena Rosendahl Bach (2:06.14) and Laura Cabanes Garzas (2:07.41).
