NEWLY-crowned European Youth Olympic champion Amelia Maughan highlighted the support of her Great Britain team-mates following her dramatic success in Finland.

The 13-year-old Bournemouth Dolphin was boosted by the sight of the British swimmers and coaches at poolside as she powered down the second length to win Tuesday’s 100m freestyle final.

“I could also see the French girl was ahead of me and I thought I was going to get the silver,” she said.

“But I could see my team-mates standing up and cheering. In the last five to seven metres I just got my head down.”

Maughan, who is due to compete in the 50m freestyle today, recorded a winning time of 56.93sec, just 0.02sec ahead of Charlotte Bonnet of France. Her previous best of 57.57sec was itself a Dorset junior record, so Maughan bettered that by 0.64sec.

Her win sparked poolside celebrations not only among her GB team-mates in Tampere but 1,000 miles away in Sheffield, where some of her Dolphins club-mates were gathering for this week’s National Age Group Championships.

“Her team-mates here are elated by the news,” said Dolphins coach Graham Bassi. “Amelia is a very popular member of our team.”

Her gold also set a record for Bassi himself as the first British coach to have three winners at European Youth Olympic level.

The others, Kate Haywood and Lizzie Simmonds, whom he coached at Lincoln, went on to swim in Olympic finals in Beijing.

Bassi added: “I’m so proud to have a third youth Olympic champion because it’s what my programmes are about – producing for the future.

“I always felt Amelia had a strong chance of winning gold medals. This was an outstanding performance for someone so young and it stands her in good stead for the future.”