After bursting onto the scene at this year’s Australian Swimming Championships in April, Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) scholarship holder James Roberts has picked up his first gold medal at an open international meet, winning the 100m freestyle at the Mare Nostrum Swim Series in Canet on the French Riviera.

The 20-year-old, who has spent the majority of the last four weeks at altitude training with his AIS squad in Spain under Coach John Fowlie, covered the two laps in an impressive 49.02 seconds and was followed into the wall by Victorian Matt Targett for silver in 49.20.

The Gold Coast prodigy split the race in an even 24.00 seconds, turning sixth at the half mark only to come home in a remarkable 25.02 for gold.

The Australian ‘one-two’ from Roberts and Targett, who are both likely to team up with James Magnussen and Eamon Sullivan for the 4x100m freestyle relay at the world championships in Shanghai next month, also sent a message to the French, with Jeremy Stravius (49.22) and Yannick Agnel (49.24) finishing third and fourth respectively on home soil.

Roberts and his AIS teammates including Alicia Coutts will now return home to Canberra to finalise preparations for the world championships.

‘It’s been an important campaign for us, training at altitude and then competing at the Mare Nostrum Series and I was really happy to finish off the campaign with some great racing tonight,’ said Fowlie.

‘We’re looking forward to getting home and getting the final preparations done before Shanghai next month.’