PARIS (Reuters) - France smashed the men's 4x100 metres freestyle relay European record at the Paris Open on Thursday.

Amaury Leveaux, Fabien Gilot, Frederick Bousquet and individual world record holder Alain Bernard clocked 3:12.54 to beat the mark set by Italy at the world championships last year by 1.50 seconds.

The quartet were only 0.08 seconds outside the world record set by the United States on Aug 19, 2006.

"It was very close and we are far from our best physically," said Gilot. "It is very promising for this summer."

France will be among the hot favourites at the Beijing Olympics, which will be held from Aug 8-24.

(Reporting by Julien Pretot, editing by Martin Petty)