Federica Pellegrini, the 2008 Olympic and a four-time world champion, claimed a 200m freestyle silver medal at the European Championships on Thursday, 11 years after her first continental success.
At 32, Pellegrini has her sights set on a fifth Olympics in Tokyo in two months’ time.
On Thursday, however, it was 21-year-old Barbora Seemanova of the Czech Republic who denied her the chance to claim a fifth European gold in the distance.
Seemanova won in a time of 1min 56.27sec with the Italian 0.2sec behind.
Britain’s Freya Anderson, in 1:56.42, took bronze edging out France’s defending champion Charlotte Bonnet.