Manaudou and new wave of Germans rule in Europe

Laure Manaudou of France and a new wave of German world record-breakers gave their rivals from America to Australia plenty to ponder at the European Swimming Championships.

The indefatigable Manaudou could not have made a worse start than her botched 400 metres individual medley heat on day one when she admitted she might have trained too hard.

But by the time the championships closed on Sunday she had broken one world and one European record and become the first woman to win four individual events at a single European Championships, adding three bronzes for good measure.

Manaudou broke the last individual European long-course record held by East Germany, dating back to 1987, in Wednesday's 800 freestyle, scooped two more golds in the 200 individual medley and 100 backstroke and rounded it off by breaking her own 400 freestyle world record.

Meanwhile, Britta Steffen led Germany's women on a sensational world record spree, bagged four gold medals and just missed a fifth.

Steffen first drew attention when she recorded the fastest relay split ever as Germany broke Australia's 4x100 freestyle relay world record. Two days later she claimed Australian Libby Lenton's 100 freestyle world mark in 53.30 seconds.

Next she shared in Germany's 4x200 freestyle relay, which eclipsed the US world mark by a huge 2.60 seconds and witnessed an anchor leg by team-mate Annika Liebs that annihilated the previous fastest split time.

Finally, it was gold in the 50 freestyle and silver in the medley relay in the last session of the championships.

The two freestyle relay records dated back to the 2004 Athens Olympics and their comprehensive destruction by the German quartets will give the Australians and Americans a spur to hit back at next year's world championships in Melbourne and the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

World and Olympic champion Otylia Jedrzejczak made a brave return to the championship arena after a road accident last October when she was driving the car in which her brother died.

Jedrzejczak, who led Poland to silver in the 4x200 freestyle relay, upstaged Manaudou and Liebs in a formidable swim in the 200 free and emphatically won the European 200 butterfly title for the fourth time.

Fellow Olympic champion Pieter van den Hoogenband, who like Manaudou in Budapest won four individual gold medals at the 1999 European Championships, also made a triumphant reappearance since retaining his 100 freestyle title at the 2004 Athens Games.

Having missed the 2005 World Championships after back surgery, the 28-year-old Dutchman returned to reclaim his 200 metres freestyle crown.

However, he had to settle for third in the 100m behind Italian world champion Filippo Magnini.