Olympic champion Kosuke Hagino continued his preparations for the upcoming world swimming championships in Hungary with a dominant win in the men's 400 meters individual medley at the French Open on Saturday.
Hagino powered home in a time of 4 minutes, 13.73 seconds to easily beat Switzerland's Jeremy Desplanches, who clocked 4:18.28 for second place. Spain's Joan-Lluis Pons Ramon took third in 4:20.80.
The 22-year-old Hagino took the silver medal in the 400 freestyle and 200 IM at the 2013 worlds in Barcelona but missed the 2015 meet in Kazan, Russia, through injury.
He has said he is determined to finally win gold at the July 14-30 worlds in Budapest, although he admitted when he left Japan for Europe last month that there were unspecified issues he was struggling with.
In other races at the French Open, Ryosuke Irie won the men's backstroke in 53.56 seconds, while Yui Ohashi finished runner-up to Olympic champion Katinka Hosszu of Hungary in the women's 200 meters IM.
Daiya Seto was entered in the men's 400 IM and the 200 butterfly but pulled out of both events due to feeling unwell.
