Ryan Gambin concluded his commitments in the European Championships yesterday in Eindhoven, The Netherlands where he took part in the 50m freestyle.

Gambin finished in 48th place, clocking a time of 23.97, that is .8 seconds away from the set time of 23.13 seconds to qualify for the Beijing Olympic Games.

However, the Maltese swimmer was not disappointed as he was not expecting to qualify in this event. Despite this failure, Gambin still managed to set a new national record for the event. He himself had established a new record a few weeks ago at Tal-Qroqq Pool when he clocked 24.70 seconds. Yesterday’s result showed that he clipped a further .83 seconds off his own previous record.

It was his fourth record in this edition of the European Championships – one for every event he took part in.

In the 100m butterfly on Thursday, Gambin clocked 54.33 seconds which enabled him to qualify in that event for the forthcoming Beijing Olympics – the first ever Maltese swimmer to do so on his own merit. On Tuesday he had set a new national record for the 50m butterfly on 24.81 seconds, while on Saturday he also set a new record for the 50m backstroke on 26.78 seconds.

Gambin is now expected back in Malta today where he is to have a rest before starting his preparations for his participation in the Beijing Olympics in August.