Matt Sates won double gold on the first day of the Mare Nostrum tour in Monaco with Lydia Jacoby and Arno Kamminga also among the winners .
Sates claimed the first gold of the meet when he was the only man inside 3:50 in the 400 free in 3:49.27.
Antonio Djakovic of Switzerland (3:50.65) and Estonia’s Kregor Zirk (3:51.71) completed the podium.
The South African then closed out the first day of finals by taking the 200IM in 1:57.43 ahead of the USA’s Samuel Stewart (1:58.31) and Jaouad Syoud of Algeria (1:59.02).
It was a new PB for Sates who is second in the South African all-time standings behind only Darian Townsend and his time of 1:57.03 from the super-suited era of 2009.
Lydia Jacoby: Photo Courtesy: Arena
Olympic champion Jacoby won the women’s 100br in 1:06.25 ahead of South Africa’s Lara van Niekerk (1:06.60) with European gold medallist Sophie Hansson next home in 1:07.46.
Kamminga, the Olympic silver medallist, took the men’s 200br in 2:10.91 ahead of Britain’s Adam Chillingworth (2:12.52) and Constantin Malachi (2:17.83).
Yohann Ndoye-Brouard continued his winning form to take the men’s 100 back in 53.62 ahead of Michael Andrew (53.97).
Noé Ponti – Olympic bronze medallist over 100 fly – won the 200in 1:56.51, overhauling Chad Le Clos who was 0.23 adrift in 1:56.74.
Tokyo finalist Leonardo de Deus rounded out the podium in 1:57.14.
Maxime Grousset won the men’s 100 free in 48.70 with Nandor Nemeth out-touching Szebasztian Szabo by 0.01 in 49.13 to 49.14.
Noé Ponti: Photo Courtesy: Giorgio Scala / deepbluemedia
Zsuzsanna Jakabos led from start to finish to win the women’s 400IM in 4:43.31, two seconds ahead of her fellow Hungarian Dalma Sebestyen who stopped the clock at 4:45.31.
Mireia Belmonte, the 2016 Olympic bronze medallist, was seventh.
Marrit Steenbergen was the only woman inside 2mins in the 200 free, the Netherlands swimmer touching in 1:58.93 with Tessa Giele taking the 100 fly in 59.12 and Pauline Mahieu taking the 200 back in 2:12.02.