In his semi-final, 24-year-old Zirk posted a time of 1 minute 55.64 seconds, just 0.06 seconds off the Estonian national record he had swum in the heats earlier the same day.

"Absolutely unbelievable day," said Zirk after the semi-final. "The morning result was very emotional and it was hard to even take a lunch break during the day. But I believed before the semi-final that if I could swim a similar time to this morning, I should make the final and I did."

The fastest in the semi-finals was Italy's Alberto Razzetti, who swam 1 minute 55.09 seconds,

Ahead of the final, Zirk said he was not feeling any pressure. "My minimum goal was to swim in the semi-finals, but with this final and this time, I have already exceeded all my expectations. Anything can happen in the final, but I can only control what I do, so technically I'm trying to keep things under control and just enjoy the final of the World Championships."

In his heat on Tuesday morning, Zirk's time also met the qualification standard for this summer's Paris Olympics.

The final of the men's 200m butterfly in Doha gets underway on Wednesday evening at 6.53 p.m. Estonian time.

While Zirk will become the first Estonian to swim in the final of a men's World Championship, two Estonians have reached men's Olympic swimming finals, though both were before Estonia regained independence.

The first was Veiko Siimar, who finished eighth in the 100m backstroke at the 1960 Rome Olympics. Ivar Stukolkin won the bronze medal in the 400m freestyle at the 1980 Moscow Olympics.

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