It did not take the pressure of a final for Daniil Pakhomov to put in a performance worthy of a champion in the men's 100m butterfly, as he set Russia's third world junior record of the Baku 2015 European Games.
Pakhomov swam the race in 52.25 seconds in his heat at the Baku Aquatics Centre on Friday, a day after winning the gold in the 200m butterfly.
"I expected it," he said. "I have been swimming fast in training and my coaches told me I could increase my speed. I can go even faster."
His record has helped Russia's men get back in the race with their country's women, who have so far set the first two world junior records and won 22 gold medals compared with 10 from the men.
"It's been like that for a while," Pakhomov added. "They are always winning like that. Can we beat them? We can try."
Maria Astashkina set the 200m breaststroke record on Thursday (2:23.06), then helped team-mates Mariia Kameneva, Polina Egorova and Arina Openysheva to a new standard in the 4x100m medley (4:03.22).
Anton Chupkov was a fraction outside his previous junior world record in the 100m breaststroke heats, meanwhile. He clocked 1:00.94, just short of the 1:00.84 he recorded at the Nanjing 2014 Youth Olympic Games.
It did not go all Russia's way, however. Denmark's Julie Jensen overtook Kameneva to make her mark in the morning heats of the 50m freestyle, and also finished ahead of Dutch favourite Marrit Steenbergen.
Aleksandr Prokofev failed to qualify for the semi-final of the men's 200m freestyle because team-mates Elisei Stepanov and Nikolay Snegirev were faster, and only two representatives from one country can go through.
Azerbaijan had reason to celebrate, meanwhile, as Anton Jeltyakov qualified for the semi-final of the men's 100m breaststroke to put himself closer to his goal of becoming the first Azerbaijani to reach a final.
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