CANET - Gabriella Fagundez (SWE) and Ryosuke Irie (JPN) set meet records on the first day of action at the Canet round of the three-stop Mare Nostrum Tour in France on Wednesday.

Fagundez raced to a 1:57.99 victory in the 200m freestyle ahead of world s/c champion Camille Muffat (FRA), 1:58.19, and 100m butterfly world champion Sarah Sjoestrom (SWE), on 1:58.35, 0.08sec ahead of Russia's Veronika Popova.

Irie was another to upset the local wish-list of winners, a 53.72 meet mark in the 100m backstroke keeping at bay Jérémy Stravius (FRA), on 53.94, with world champion Junya Koga (JPN) confined to bronze in 54.49, 0.11sec ahead of Ben Treffers (AUS).

Meet records fell to Alex Dale Oen, of Norway, and Japanese duo Ryosuke Irie and Natsumi Hoshi on the last day of action at the Canet round of the Mare Nostrum Tour in France as some of the world's fastest fish warmed up for battle at world titles in Shanghai next month.

Dale One steamed on 1:00.29 in the 100m breaststroke, his the only threat to the minute mark as the minor spoils went to Ryo Tateishi (JPN) in 1:00.94, and world 50m champion Cameron Van Der Burgh (RSA), on 1:01.14.

Irie (JPN) set a meet record of 1:54.54 in the 200m backstroke as he continued to show why he will be among strong medal hopes in the event at world titles in Shanghai next month. The closest rival was well back, teammate Kazuki Watanabe on 1:58.21, third place going to Hungary's Peter Bernek, on 2:00.09, locking out Russian veteran Arkady Vyatchanin, on 2:00.78.

Hoshi cracked the meet record in the 200m butterfly in 2:07.40, Marina Granstrom (SWE) second in 2:08.03, with world champion Jessica Schipper (AUS) taking bronze in 2:10.55. The equivalent men's final produced a tight finish but Takeshi Matsuda and Ryusuke Sakata (JPN) were the only two to break 1:56, on 1:55.25 and 1:55.80 respectively. The bronze went to Kaio Almeida (BRA) on 1:56.00 ahead of Olympic silver medallist Laszlo Cseh (HUN), on 1:56.50.

In their wake came Cseh's young teammate Bence Biczo, 1:56.56, Dinko Jukic, the Austrian who refused a dope test of late, on 1:56.65, and Commonwealth champion Chad Le Clos (RSA), on 1:56.74. The next and final stop of the Trophy will be held Monte Carlo this weekend.