Three world records were set yesterday at the European short-course championships.

Evelyn Verrastzo of Hungary beat her own best time in the women's 200-meter individual medley by finishing in 2 minutes, 4.64 seconds. That bettered her previous record of 2:06:01, which was set last month in Moscow.

Two different Russian teams broke the men's 4x50-meter medley relay record. The lineup of Stanislav Donets, Stanislav Lakhtyukhov, Evgeny Korotyshkin and Evgeny Lagunov posted a time of 1:32.08 in the heats, but that was trumped hours later in the final when Donets and Korotyshkin combined with Sergey Geybel and Sergey Fesikov to win in 1:31.80.

The previous world record of 1:32.91 was set by Italy in Croatia last year.

The event in Istanbul is one of the last meets before full-body, high-performance suits are banned.

The use of polyurethane and neoprene suits, which cut down on fatigue and gave swimmers more buoyancy and speed, led to many world records.

At this year's world championships in Rome, 43 world records were set.