ISLE OF WIGHT breaststroker Darren Mew defied two injuries as well as the odds to book his place on the British team for the world championships in Montreal in July.

Mew, 25, saw off three fellow Olympians to win the 100m breaststroke at the British championships in Manchester - despite having done only five weeks' training since returning from Athens last August.

He passed two of them in the last 25 metres after they had set the pace.

Even more impressively, his time of 1:01.28 precisely hit Britain's tough qualifying time, based on the 10th fastest time in the world last year.

Mew, who trains at Bath University, said: "I had an operation on an elbow injury after the Olympics and started training again in January.

"But I only got five weeks training in before I broke my hand during circuit training.

"I came here hoping to swim 62 seconds, so to do 61.2 and qualify for the world championships is fantastic."

Second, third and fourth behind Mew were no less a trio than James Gibson (Olympic finalist and world bronze medallist), Chris Cook (Olympic 200m semi-finalist) and Adam Whitehead (Commonwealth champion).

Mew earlier came second to reigning 50m world champion Gibson in the one-length event in 28.18.

This was 0.12sec outside the qualifying time, but Mew can expect to join Gibson in this event in Montreal unless someone else qualifies ahead of him in the last chance meet in June.