Budapest (AFP)

Led by Marie Wattel and Charlotte Bonnet, the women's 4x100m relay brought the French team its first medal of the week, in bronze, at the European Swimming Championships, Monday in Budapest, and its qualification for the Olympic Games. of Tokyo is within easy reach.

Three years ago in Glasgow, already with Bonnet and Wattel, but also with Béryl Gastaldello, the other tricolor sprinter who goes up, the French women were adorned with gold.

Without Gastaldello this time, who remained to train in the United States, but with Anouckha Martin and Assia Touati, they finished third (3: 35.92), behind Great Britain (3: 34.17) and the Netherlands (3 : 34.29).

"This is not the usual line-up, we thought we would be left much more behind by the Dutch women in particular, and we are really not far from first place, it's cool", rejoices Bonnet.

Beyond the European podium, what should be remembered is that the French relay can almost say that it holds its place for the Olympics in ten weeks (July 23-August 8).

To be invited, the blue quartet, absent - for nine hundredths - of the 2019 Worlds where twelve of the sixteen Olympic tickets have been distributed, must imperatively be part of the four best world nations having not yet pocketed one, as of May 31. .

- "A playing card in Tokyo" -

After this continental final, he occupies second position, thanks to his 3 min 35 sec 64 swam in Saint-Raphaël last December, behind the British performance in the Hungarian basin.

Danes and Italians, among others, remain behind.

Both Wattel and Bonnet are already projecting themselves in Tokyo.

"We are not at our best level, we know, that was not the objective either, recalls the first. In Tokyo, we will have a good card to play. Why not dream and go for a podium? I think it's possible. With sharpening, with Beryl that can add speed to us, I really believe in this stint. "

With Gastaldello, and "with more level and more form in a few months, that gives hope for a big thing, it is clear", abounds the second.

Shortly before the 4x100 m final, Wattel qualified for the 100 m butterfly, scheduled for Tuesday evening, with the second fastest time, in 57 sec 48. Only the Swedish Louise Hansson was faster (56.73), as in the series .

Wattel, who trains in Loughborough, England, has never yet reached an international individual podium.

Mélanie Hènes, over 50 m (25.08, 14th time), and the young Yohann Ndoye Brouard, on 50 m backstroke (25.11, 10th time), did not pass the cut of the semi-finals.

- Kolesnikov on the rise -

It was in this non-Olympic race that Kliment Kolesnikov became the first man under 24 seconds by improving his world record by seven hundredths, in 23 sec 93 (against 24.00 in 2018 in Glasgow).

At 20, Kolesnikov, triple European champion 2018 (50 m backstroke, 100 m backstroke and 4x100 m men), is progressing: over 100 m, the queen race, he presents himself with the best world performance of the season , in 47 sec 31, and lowered his personal best, which then dated from 2018, by more than seven tenths in two days in April.

Accustomed to the podiums and their highest step: a few days after celebrating her 32th birthday, Katinka Hosszu offered herself a fourteenth continental crown, the fourth in the 400m medley (after 2012, 2014 and 2016).

The Hungarian won in 4 min 32 sec 73, the second best performance in the world of the season.

The one which has for trademark to chain the departures without respite, which is worth to him to be nicknamed "Iron Lady" (the Iron Lady), this time granted a lighter program, with two other individual races. only, the 200m medley and the 200m butterfly.

© 2021 AFP