Despite struggling with illness, Jess Schipper has shown all of her renowned fighting qualities to force her way onto the Delhi Commonwealth Games team with victory in the 200 metres butterfly at the trials in Sydney.

The asthma-suffering butterfly star’s place in the team bound for India was in jeopardy heading into her pet event in a week where she has been flattened by sickness and breathing problems.

But reigning world champion Schipper (two minutes and 7.66 seconds) managed to somehow still hold out Samantha Hamill (2:07.75) in a tight finish at Sydney Olympic Park.

“Probably at the 135m [mark] my breath started to shorten and I could feel it happening,” she said.

“I kept telling myself to relax and take deep breaths, and just telling myself this was the last one [race], and it didn’t matter if I died [in the race] someone would save me at the end.”

Schipper was not alone in having to wait until the final day to earn a ticket to Delhi.

Ashley Callus (22.09 seconds) showed he was the man over one lap in Australia at the moment, claiming his first national title in seven years by winning comfortably ahead of Cameron Prosser (22.36) and former world record holder Eamon Sullivan (22.38).

Callus’s swim booked him a spot on his fourth Commonwealth Games and more than made up for missing out on last year’s world championships.

“Never too old, like a fine wine I like to say, but it is good to go that time under the pressure of tonight’s race,” the 31-year-old said.

“I had time off after Beijing and the fire was still in the belly and as I lost a bit of time with illness and injury and I still have something to prove to myself.

“It has been seven years since I last won this national title so after missing last year this is nice and sweet.”

However, as sweet as Callus’s victory was for the hulking Queenslander, 2009 national title holder Matthew Abood (22.53) was a shattered figure after finishing fourth.

It was Abood’s last chance of making the team after his disappointing seventh placing in the 100m freestyle.

In the men’s 200m breaststroke, Brenton Rickard (two minutes and 9.31 seconds) smashed the field.

He beat home Craig Calder (2:12.33) with world record holder Christian Sprenger (2:12.71) being humbled with a third-place finish.

Stephanie Rice (4:35.04) completed a fine week by wrapping up her third national title in the 400m medley with an exhausted Hamill (4:40.44) holding out Blair Evans (4:40.49).

Robert Hurley (15:00.96) finished off the evening’s racing by just missing out on breaking the 15-minute barrier in his triumph in the 1,500m.

Reigning 5km open water world champion Melissa Gorman (16:03.24) broke Hayley Lewis’s 17-year-old Commonwealth record in the non-Olympic women’s 1,500m by 1.6 seconds.

Kylie Palmer finished a distant second in 16:41.71.

“A lot of the distance records have been held for a long time and we are slowly starting to chip away at them, like Kylie Palmer in the 800m at the Beijing Olympics,” Gorman said.

“A lot of us girls are really getting down there which is really great for distance swimming in the future.”

-AAP