Akira Honda won the gold medal in the men's 200m butterfly at the World Swimming Championships held in Qatar, Middle East.
This is Honda's first gold medal at the World Championships.
The men's 200m butterfly final was held on the 14th, the 13th day of the World Swimming Championships being held in Doha, Qatar.
From Japan, 22-year-old Honda, a silver medalist in this event at the Tokyo Olympics, advanced to the final after passing the semifinals in second place.
Honda was said to have injured his ankle, but he was in second place after the first 50 meters and took the lead just before 100 meters.
In the second half, which is his specialty, he showed powerful swimming and pulled away from the other swimmers in the final 50 meters, winning the gold medal with a time of 1 minute 53.88 seconds.
Although France's Leon Marchand, who won the gold medal in this event at last year's World Championships, and others are not participating in this tournament, Honda has achieved solid results as the ace of the Japanese men's team, and is well on his way to winning the World Championships. It was his third consecutive medal win and his first gold medal.
Honda said, ``I'm really happy. I injured my ankle, so my focus was on that, but I concentrated and made adjustments from the semifinals and went into the finals.When my name was called and I went through the entrance gate, I thought I was just going to run a race.I was able to do it all with a smile on my face."