Twin sisters Wang Liuyi and Wang Qianyi have made history again by claiming the women's duet free title, China's third gold in artistic swimming, at the 19th FINA World Championships in Budapest on Thursday.

The 25-year-olds, who also won the women's technical duet and the women's team technical, beat the Ukrainian and Austrian teams with a score of 95.5667 points. The Ukrainian Aleksiiva sisters, Maryna and Vladyslava, got the silver medal with 94.1667, while Anna-Maria and Eirini Alexandria of Austria came third on 92.8000. 

"I feel very happy and excited to win the third gold medal for the Chinese artistic swimming team," older sister Wang Liuyi said following the final. "The help of the coach and the encouragement of teammates have given us a lot of motivation. We have overcome fatigue and various difficulties. I did very well today and I'm satisfied with my performance." 

Wang Qianyi said: "This is the first time for us to compete in both the duet and the team events, so I felt a little bit of pressure." 

"In spite of fatigue, we were able to withstand this pressure. I feel very happy," she added. 

Since the start of the championships, the sisters have delivered seven performances in the preliminaries and the finals.

On Friday, the sisters will compete in the team free final, which will be their last appearance at the event. Wang Liuyi said: "We hope to be able to work together with our teammates in the final tomorrow, to have a better performance and achieve better results." 

"The World Championships is a big test for us. We hope to play steadily, step by step, and do a good job. I believe that no matter what kind of difficulties we encounter, we can overcome them," Qianyi added. 

On the sixth competition day of the championships, a total of five gold medals in swimming were on offer. Team USA showed its dominance again in the category by sweeping three, and Australia shared the other two.

Team USA top the rankings with 14 gold medals in total, followed by Australia with four golds, seven silvers and a bronze medal. China rank third with four gold and four bronze medals. 

(With input from Xinhua)