Great Britain’s Keely Hodgkinson defended her 800m title in style before team captain Jazmin Sawyers won a stunning long jump gold at the European Indoor Championships in Istanbul.

The Olympic and world silver medallist, who turned 21 on Friday, was almost two seconds clear of Slovene Anita Horvat.

Sawyers earned a first major title with a world-leading jump of seven metres.

The 28-year-old, who has won two European medals outdoors, could barely believe her jump – a personal best and unmatched anywhere in the world this season – which put her into the lead in the penultimate round.

Embracing Hodgkinson on the track in celebration, she then faced a nervous wait for her gold to be confirmed but Italy’s silver medallist Larissa Iapichino could not deny the elated Briton with her final 6.97m leap.

“I’ve never won anything. I’m still in shock. I feel like a seven-metre jump has been in me for so long. It’s been so long that you start to wonder if it will ever come. I didn’t know it was going to come then,” Sawyers told BBC Sport.

“Seven metres is a real jump, it won the Olympics. That will give me so much confidence going forward. I just want more of it.”

Hodgkinson has been untouchable in 2023, improving her own British record among three successive 800m victories, in addition to setting a women’s 600m world indoor record.

But, keen to make the most of every opportunity, she has still wanted more, with Jolanda Ceplak’s long-standing world record of one minute 55.82 seconds – set on the day Hodgkinson was born in 2002 – proving narrowly out of reach.

The clear favourite for gold at Atakoy Arena, the Briton quickly asserted herself at the front before storming away and raising a finger to the sky at the end of another perfectly executed race.

An emotional Hodgkinson dedicated the win to her former coach Joseph Galvin, who died earlier this week.

“I’ve not had time to process it,” she said. “This one is definitely for him. He had a lot of belief in little 10-year-old me.

“I hope to make him really proud and I know he will be up there watching, along with his wife at home who I know will be so proud of me as well.”

The Leigh athlete will now focus her attention on the outdoor season, with another shot at world gold beckoning this summer in Budapest after she came within eight hundredths of a second of American 20-year-old Athing Mu in Eugene.

Speaking on BBC TV, Britain’s world 1500m champion Jake Wightman said: “The professionalism she has shown between every round, to keep that emotion bottled up, celebrating her birthday in between, there must have been so many emotions going through her head throughout these championships.

“To be a good as she was in that final, to be so dominant, shows how good an athlete a professional Keely really is.”

Success for Hodgkinson and Sawyers on the final day of competition took Britain’s medal tally to six, following Laura Muir’s record fifth title on Saturday.

On Sawyers’ achievement, former heptathlete Denise Lewis said: “Seven metres is such a magical distance for a long jumper. To achieve that is just outstanding. I can’t believe how she has put it together.”

Jessica Ennis-Hill added: “I’m absolutely blown away. Her reaction said absolutely everything. It was just stunning to watch.”

Also at the four-day championships, Neil Gourley won men’s 1500m silver, with bronzes for Daryll Neita (60m) and Melissa Courtney-Bryant (3,000m).

Great Britain won 12 medals at the 2021 championships – more than any other nation – and finished third in the table in Istanbul behind Norway and the Netherlands.

Lake focused on mentality after missing out on medal

Britain’s Morgan Lake was unable to earn a medal in a women’s high jump competition which saw Ukraine’s Yaroslava Mahuchikh and Kateryna Tabashnyk take gold and bronze respectively.

Mahuchikh, 21, successfully defended her title with a clearance at 1.98 metres – a year on from winning an emotional world indoor gold after fleeing her home city following the Russian invasion and travelling for three days to Belgrade.

She was able to celebrate with compatriot Tabashnyk, who claimed bronze behind the Netherlands’ Britt Weerman.

But Lake, who jumped a British record 1.99m last month, could not improve on her first-time clearance over 1.86m and finished seventh.

“I started with one of the highest opening heights I’ve ever had and I had so much confidence coming in, so that’s why I’m finding it hard to process at the moment,” Lake said.

“There was no part of me that didn’t think I was going to medal so I have to deal with that now. I know where I am physically, it’s that mental side that I need to get control of.”

Ingebrigtsen completes another double

Elsewhere on Sunday, Norway’s Olympic champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen completed another superb European indoor double as he defended his 3,000m title.

The 22-year-old led from start to finish in a dominant display, setting a national record of 7:40.32 to add to his 1500m gold on Friday.

Spain’s Adel Mechaal and Serb Elzan Bibic kept Ireland’s Darragh McElhinney out of the medals, with Britons James West (7:48.22) and Jack Rowe (7:48.32) finishing eighth and ninth respectively.

Guy Learmonth, competing at his fifth European Indoors, finished sixth in the men’s 800m final, in which Spain’s Adrian Ben narrowly held off France’s Benjamin Robert to win in 1:47.34.

Britain’s men’s 4x400m relay team, featuring Ben Higgins, Joe Brier, Sam Reardon and Lewis Davey, finished fifth in 3:08.61, with Belgium taking victory in 3:05.83 ahead of France and the Netherlands.

The women’s quartet of Hannah Kelly, Carys McAulay, Nicole Kendall and Mary Abichi were sixth in 3:32.65, as the Dutch team set a championship record 3:25.66 to beat Italy and Poland to gold.

In the day’s final event, David King placed seventh in the men’s 60m hurdles final, won by Switzerland’s Jason Joseph.