The 2024 European Championships gold medalist in this event split 28.33/31.82 (1:00.15)/32.60/33.39 to overwrite her own former Danish benchmark of 2:06.65 delivered in the semi-finals of the event at the 2024 Olympic Games.
She held a comfortable margin of just under a second over the bronze medalist, Laura Garzas Cabanes, while the Danish swimmer finished two-tenths and four-hundredths of a second shy of the gold.
Rosendahl Bach had a somewhat mixed start to the final, turning in third place after 50 meters, but as the race progressed, she closed the gap on Macinnes. Unfortunately for the Dane, however, she never quite managed to pull level with the gold medalist.
The 200-meter butterfly is very much Helena Rosendahl Bach's signature event. She entered the meet as the defending European champion and had also won silver in the event at the 2024 World Championships.
This was Denmark's first medal at the European Championships, which ends on Sunday.