Shanghai lad Sun Xiaolei made a big splash in the Chinese Spring National Swimming Championships here on Monday as he broke twice the national record in a single day.

Sun, 25, clocked 25.02 seconds to take victory in the men's 50 meters backstroke final, 0.10 clear of the new national record he set several hours earlier in the heat. Cheng Yifei from Liaoning posted 25.37 for the silver and Shanghai swimmer Shi Feng finished 0.57 later to take bronze.

Sun said: "The record breaking stuff was not that surprising. After all, the previous mark by Ouyang Kunpeng was set for a couple of years. Honestly, I didn't expect that I could lift the record twice in one single day. I'm satisfied with my performance today. "

Hunan girl Li Xuanxu finally won out over a stirring teenage battle in women's 400m individual medley. Li, 17, dashed out in the final lap to pull off the gold in 4:35.73, leaving arch rival Ye Shiwen, Guangzhou Asiad gold medalist of the event, accepted the second. The bronze went to Zhou Min from Shanghai, who timed 4:47.01.

Women's 200m free was so fierce that the winner could not be told until the last moment of wall touching. All the top five players finished within 1:59 with time difference between each other no more than 0.45 seconds.

Chen Qian, National Games title holder, dashed out from lane 8 in the last lap to snatch gold in 1:58.24. Beijing star Liu Jing came back from behind to secure a silver in 1:58.35, 0.12 clear of the third, Song Wenyan from Shandong.

Shanghai swimmers Sun Ye and Ji Liping had a 1-2 finish in women's 200m breaststroke, the bronze belonged to Shi Jinglin from Jiangsu with 2:26.56.

In men's 100m freestyle, Lv Zhiwei from Zhejing chalked up 49.46 to stand runner-up to Jiang Haiqi from Shanghai. Guangdong's He Jianbin placed third in 49.99. Xie Zhi from Yunnan powered home first in 1:01.09 to claim title in men's 100m breaststroke. Shanghai's Chen Cheng swam 1:01.35 to pocket a silver with Qu Jingshang from Chinese Navy settled for bronze 0.50 slower.

Shanghai team touched the wall first 7:19.28 in men's 4x200m free relay. The silver and bronze went to Jiangsu and Guangdong respectively.