Britain's Mhairi Spence finishes eighth in World Championship

Spence has redeemed herself after European Championship frustration

Britain's Mhairi Spence achieved her best result at a World Championship as she finished eighth in Moscow.

Team-mate Katy Burke was 10th, which was also the best World Championship position of her career.

The results were a vast improvement on the European Championship in Medway where Spence was 33rd and Burke 28th.

However, only the medallists in Moscow achieved the Olympic qualifying standard to guarantee themselves places at London 2012.

Spence had been in the top five throughout the day, but the Scot dropped out of contention in her second visit to the shooting range.

Fellow Brits Freyja Prentice (16th) and Heather Fell (27th) were also in the top 30, though the GB team were just edged out of the medals in the team competition, finishing fourth.

GB's pentathlon performance director Jan Bartu said: "Mhairi and Katy redeemed themselves today after Medway. Eighth today was a good result for Mhairi.

"Finishing in the top 10 in the world is a really good result for Katy Burke, too, especially after an average start to the fencing.

"I was disappointed that we couldn't defend third position in the team event to make sure we would go home with a medal."

In the men's competition, Britain's Sam Weale achieved his best result at a World Championship to date by finishing 12th in Moscow.

However, there was disappointment for team-mate Jamie Cooke who ended his first World Championship final in 35th place.