Leatherhead’s Katherine Wyld admitted she didn’t want the opening day of the World Swimming Championships to end after marking her debut with a seventh-place finish in the 4x100m freestyle relay final.

Accompanied by Fran Halsall, Caitlin McClatchey and Amy Smith, the 23-year-old played an integral role as she twice helped lower the British 100m freestyle relay record and twice set a personal best in Rome.

Wyld swam the third leg in 54.80 seconds as Britain clocked a time of three minutes, 37.02 seconds in the heats, before personally going six hundredths of a second quicker and lowering the British record by a further three hundredths.

And the Surrey flyer – whose 100m personal best now stands at 54.74 – insisted she could have swam all day in the Italian capital.

“Our coach, Ben Titley, told us before we went out for the final to go and get 3:36 and we judged it well with the time that we swam,” said Wyld.

“The morning swim was really pleasing and to get a British record, only to lower it again, was great. Everyone swam well.

“To be a part of such great swims is fantastic and it is a great sign of things to come.

“I’m not sure if we expected to go faster – you’re usually a bit more relaxed in the morning and people step up in the final.

“It is such a great achievement to be part of the team that has done it and I don’t think you can ask for much more than that really.”

Despite twice bettering the 100m freestyle record in the Italian capital, Wyld and her team-mates played second fiddle to the Netherlands, who stormed to gold in a world record time of 3:31.72.

Germany claimed silver, with Australia third, but Wyld insists there are plenty of positives to take from her first outing in the pool at the Foro Italico.

“We would have liked to have finished a little bit higher up but our aim is to keep lowering the British record to try to get closer to the world mark,” added Wyld.

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