No stopping Hickman

The Olympic finalist James Hickman continued his record-breaking exploits at the British Short Course Championships in Sheffield yesterday.

The 20-year-old set his third record of the four-day event when winning the 400 metres individual medley convincingly. Hickman stopped the clock two-hundredths of a second inside the four-year-old mark of Grant Robins - in 4min 16.61sec.

Hickman's record climaxed a hugely successful meeting for the part-time student who broke his own 100m butterfly record on the opening day and lowered the time 24 hours later to take gold. He added gold in the 200m butterfly - the event in which he finished sixth in Atlanta - and also took the 50m butterfly title.

Leeds' Claire Huddart captured her third individual gold of the meeting when she won the 200m medley in a personal best time to give herself a perfect present on her 25th birthday.