National swimming coach Ben Smith has hailed Roy-Allan Burch’s record breaking exploits in Genoa, Italy, at the weekend as “spectacular”.

The Olympic swimmer got more than he bargained for in the Genoa 40 Trofeo swim meet in Genoa, Italy, capturing the silver medal in the 100 metres freestyle and eclipsing his own national record (50.22) in the same discipline — twice!

He also recorded a personal best (56.80) in the 100 metres butterfly.

“It was a spectacular swim for early in the season and I know he’s really excited with the form that he is presently in,” said Smith.

Working out with world class swimmers, such as 11-time Olympic medallist Ryan Lochte, appears to be having a positive affect on Burch.

Lochte joined the Bermudian’s swim team, SwimMac Carolina, last month.

“Ryan recently joined the programme so Roy has been working really hard against top level swimmers and taking this first opportunity to compete and show what kind of shape he’s in,” added Smith.

“It bodes well this early in the season for him to be swimming that fast.”

Burch, who is based in North Carolina, lowered the bar after touching the wall in 49.94 in the preliminaries to advance to the final as the fourth fastest qualifier.

It was the first time the swimmer has achieved a sub-50 second 100m freestyle on the short course

Burch’s new record didn’t last long, though, as he lowered it to 49.29 en route to a second-place finish in the final.

“I felt like I had the win but was just touched out by Lorenzo Benatti of Italy,” Burch said.

He said breaking the 50 second barrier was a “huge racing breakthrough”.

“Many times I over-think when I race but this race allowed me to get back to my pure racing instincts and just go for it,” he said. “I was pleased with how it went and it showed me that my training is going well.”

Burch managed to compete at a high level despite experiencing fatigue from the long journey from North America to Europe and intense training on the eve of the swim meet.

“Despite travelling almost 20 hours and having our first overseas competition for the year, the coach still decided to work us hard the day we arrived and the night before the competition,” he explained.

“I was so tired and my body was in so much pain, but I have been training extremely hard so I can dig deep into my well of fitness.”