A WIRRAL swimmer is celebrating after breaking a British record during the European Junior Championships.

Freya Anderson, 15 travelled to Hungary to take part in the competition for team GB where she won five medals including gold in the freestyle swim which saw her beat the current record.

The record was previously held by Olympian and North West swimmer Fran Halsall, where she set it at the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, Australia.

Speaking after the event Freya, said: “It was so exciting representing my country for the first time – there was a great team spirit and we were all looking out for each other and supporting each other”

She took almost half a second off Halsall’s record in the preliminaries and took further time off in the final making Anderson the third fastest woman this year in the open age group 100 freestyle and 7th all-time fastest woman in Great Britain for this event as well as making her European Junior Champion.

Freya’s success continued through the championships when she help Great Britain secure a further two bronze medals.

During the championships, Great Britain held second place in the medal table, until the last day where they slipped into 3rd place behind a strong Italian team.

The top three teams were:

Russian who gained 22 medals-11 gold, five silver and six bronze

Italy who also gained 22 medals – nine gold, eight silver and five bronze

Great Britain gained 19 medals with five Gold, four silver, ten bronze