KAZAN (RUSSIA) - Adam Peaty won the men's 100m breaststroke gold at the world swimming championships in Kazan on Monday to give Britain their first world champion in the event for 40 years.
Great Britain's Adam Peaty reacts after winning the men's 100m breaststroke swimming event at the 2015 FINA World Championships in Kazan on August 3, 2015
The 20-year-old, who is making his worlds debut, swam 58.52 seconds with Olympic champion Cameron van der Burgh of South Africa taking silver at 0.07secs as he lost out to Commonwealth champion Peaty on the wall.
Britain's Ross Murdoch took bronze at 0.57secs back.
"It wasn’t the time I expected to do and it wasn’t the time I wanted, but world championship finals and Olympic finals are only about the win and I brought it home tonight," beamed Peaty.
Peaty fought for the title, chasing Van der Burgh down hard in the dying stages to nick gold and leave the South African to again settle for silver having lost out to Australia's Christian Sprenger two years ago.
The new world champion admitted seeing Van der Burgh comfortably ahead at the turn had given him extra motivation.
"I turned and saw his (Van der Burgh's) feet and I was like 'right, I’ve got some catching up to do now'," said Peaty.
"Twenty-five metres out he was still in front, so I was a bit sceptical, but I remembered what I had trained for was moments like this and I came out on top -- thankfully."
This is the first time Britain has a world champion in the event since David Wilkie won both the 100 and 200m breaststroke titles at the 1975 championships in Cali, Colombia.
Peaty added the world crown to his Commonwealth Games victory in Glasgow last year, when he also beat Van der Burgh, and the pair are poised to resume their battle for the Olympic crown in Rio de Janeiro next year.
Peaty and Van der Burgh had broken the championship record three times between them in the heats and semi-finals in Kazan en route to the final.