German swimmer Britta Steffen finished a surprising touchdown first and won her home country the eighth gold at the Beijing Olympics in the women's 100-meter freestyle on Friday.

Steffen stole the spotlight from world record holder Lisbeth Trickett from Australia as photographers were ready to focus on the Aussie to celebrate her second gold in Beijing,

The German girl also bettered the Olympic record she wrote five days ago from 53.38 to 53.12 seconds.

After narrowly squeaking into the final, the former world-record holder in the event, Steffen was seemed to be a forgotten athlete, sitting in eighth place and out of the medal race. Steffen finished the first 50m in the last but then managed a magic surpass by arriving on the strength of a back-half split of 27.08, 0.79s faster than anyone else in the pool.