POOLE’S Jacob Peters returned from Glasgow with a European Championship gold medal after contributing to a British victory in the men’s medley relay.

Peters, who was making his GB senior debut, swam the butterfly leg in the morning heats and admitted he had been “very nervous” before taking over from breaststroker James Wilby and handing over to freestyler Duncan Scott.

Wilby had earlier become the third fastest 100m breaststroker in history behind the world record-breaking Adam Peaty, while Scott was the 200m freestyle champion.

Peters said: “We were favourites for gold and I was nervous because if I went too early, I could have disqualified us in the heats.”

In fact, all four British heat swimmers did safe takeovers with Peters clocking a speedy 52.35 seconds on his leg.

Anchorman Scott’s 48.96 took Britain to victory in heat two and third fastest into the final, where Nick Pyle, Peaty, James Guy and Scott stormed to gold in championship record time.

Peters’ individual events were more of a mixed bag.

In the 200m butterfly, a time within three seconds of his British 17yrs age group record of 1:57.16 would have put him in the semi-finals. But his heat time of 2:00.40 placed him only 24th out of 37 swimmers.

In the 50m fly heats, he became the first British 17-year-old to go under 24 seconds, lowering his British age group and Dorset senior records to 23.95, which placed him 22nd.

In the 100m fly, he recorded 53.02 – just 0.10sec off his national and county mark and his best heat time to date – to improve his ranking from 34th to 21st out of 59.

Peters said: “Overall, I was quite pleased. It was all good experience and I am learning a lot.

“I am not sure what happened with the 200m. Some people thought I went out too fast but I think I went too slow and couldn’t really bring it back.

“Nerves may have been part of it but not all of it. Maybe I’m also a bit tired after doing the Commonwealth Games and European juniors and seniors this year.”

Peters, who turns 18 on Monday, will now have a debrief with Poole coach Barry Alldrick and take his first proper break since the world juniors a year ago.

“I’ll get back to training in September and get my head down to try to qualify for the World Championship next year and the Olympics in 2020,” Peters added.

Alldrick said: “I hope Jacob has come back really fresh and knowing he has a two-year challenge.

“I think Glasgow was a good lesson about the depth in senior swimming and that he still has work to do.

“We’re going to up his training to 10 full sessions a week, which I think will improve his aerobic fitness and help his 200m.”

Former Swim Bournemouth ace Jay Lelliott, now training with City of Sheffield, came 13th in the 400m freestyle in 3:50.21.