Filippi was a popular winner in the women's 1,500m freestyle as she came from behind to give Italy the gold medal in a championship record time of 15:44.93.

Denmark's Lotte Friis, who looked on world record course for the first 600m and led for the first 1,000m, finished second, in a time of 15:46.30, while Romanian Camelia Alina Potec won the bronze in 15:55.63.

At the end of her swim Filippi took a bow as the crowd gave her a standing ovation while they were chanting her first name.

Junya Koga broke the championship record in winning the men's 100m backstroke gold medal. The Japanese finished in a time of 52.26 seconds, beating his own record by .13 secs.

Germany's Helge Meeuw took the silver medal in 52.54, while the bronze medal went to Spain's Aschwin Wildeboer, who was just one tenth behind Meeuw.

Meeuw said that like the rest of the team, he had taken inspiration from Biedermann's fantastic performances. 'It is very important to have somebody like Paul in the team. His victory gave us strength and created a fantastic feeling in the team.

It is very important that we have two swimmers like Britta Steffen and Paul Biedermann to lead the others. We look up to them and we want to emulate their success.'

In the last final of the evening American world record holder Rebecca Soni comfortably won the women's 100m breaststroke in a time of 1:04.93, just nine hundredth off her world record.

Russian Yuliya Efimova took silver in 1:05.41, while American Kasey Carlson won the bronze medal in 1:05.75.

Soni said it was an amazing race. 'My life has changed a bit since the Olympics. Swimming-wise it has been a change, but I have just enjoyed coming to Rome and swimming here.

'A lot of people were surprised at our team, but it is all coming together.'

South African Cameron Van den Burgh, who Monday won a bronze medal in the men's 100m breaststroke, managed to break Felipe Franca da Silva's world record in the men's 50m breaststroke semi-finals.

Van den Burgh had a time of 26.74, beating the Brazilian's time of 26.89 by. 15 seconds.

Da Silva finished with the third-best time of 26.92, while Germany's Hendrik Feldwehr had the second-fastest time in 26.83.