Butterfly Star Harriet Jones Books Semi-Final Spot At European Champs In Hungary

By Ian Gordon

Harriet Jones booked a spot in Monday’s semi-finals of the 100m butterfly at the European Championships in Budapest.

The 23-year-old clocked 59.36 secs finishing fifth in her heat as France’s Marie Wattel won in 57.69.

Jones, who is the Welsh record holder over 50m butterfly, was 15th fastest of the 16 qualifiers for the semis later today.

But 200m specialist Alys Thomas just missed out, her eighth place in the heat of 59.46 seeing her miss out on the semis by one place and 0.07 of-a-second.

Matt Richards, who broke two Welsh records at the British trials in April, helped the GB team qualify for the semi-finals of the 4x100m freestyle relay.

The 18-year-old clocked 49.12secs on the opening leg as he teamed up with James Guy, Jacob Whittle and Joe Litchfield to finish third in the heat in 3:14.29.

In the 400m freestyle, Kieran Bird – who won the British trials in 3:46.00 – finished seventh in his heat in 3:53.97.

Six Welsh swimmers are competing at the Europeans and then the Olympic Games in Tokyo in July, beating the tally of four that went to Rio in 2016.