Heather Fell (pictured), Katy Livingston and Mhairi Spence teamed up to finish second behind the Hungarian hosts.

 

It rounded off an impressive World Championships for the British women at which Livingston had already won an individual bronze medal and the trio of Fell, Georgina Harland and Spence won team silver.
 
The team topped the table after the shooting in today’s team relay, but were overtaken by Poland after the fencing.

 

Hungary went to the top of the table after the swimming, with Britain remaining second and Poland dropping to third.
 
The positions were unaltered going into the final discipline, the run, with Hungary leading Britain by just 72 points.

 

The Hungarians took gold by just 10 seconds, with Great Britain taking silver and Poland bronze.
 
Jan Bartu, Pentathlon Britain's performance director, said: r“It was a successful day for us.

 

"We competed well, but congratulations to Hungary, they were just that little bit better than us today.

 

"We now need to go away and refocus on the challenges ahead.”

 

Today’s performances also came as the International Modern Pentathlon Union (UIPM) confirmed that four British women – Livingston, Fell, Harland and Spence – have achieved the Olympic qualifying standard for Beijing.
 
Livingston appears on the UIPM long list by virtue of performances at the 2007 European Championships and 2008 World Championships and Fell through her performance at last year’s European Championships.

 

Spence and Harland feature on the UIPM long list through the Olympic ranking list.
 
However, each country can only take up to two qualifying athletes of each gender to the Games.
 
The British men’s pairing of Sam Weale and Nick Woodbridge are waiting to learn whether they will qualify through the UIPM’s Olympic ranking list.