Nine English swimmers selected for European Championships in Belgrade

Nine English swimmers have been selected out of a group of 13 British athletes to represent Aquatics GB in the pool and marathon swimming events at the European Aquatics Championships.

European senior and junior medallists are amongst the group taking to the pool in June whilst the Olympic marathon swimming team continue their preparations for Paris at the event.

The Olympic Games-bound trio of Leah Crisp, Toby Robinson and Wales’ Hector Pardoe will start off the action when they take to the open water on 12 June.

World Championship bronze medallist Pardoe and three-time World Championship competitor Robinson (both Loughborough University) will contest the men’s 10km event as they build towards the Olympic race in August, while Bath Performance Centre athlete Crisp will line up for the women’s 10km race as she prepares for her Olympic debut.

Five days later and a young cohort of British swimmers will look to make their mark on the senior international stage.

Amongst the ten athletes selected is Ed Mildred, who won Mixed 4x100m Freestyle Relay silver and Men’s 4x100m Freestyle Relay bronze at the last European Championships in Rome two years ago.

He looks set to lead the team in the Serbian capital with the Bath Performance Centre athlete the only one of the ten to who have competed at a senior long course event in a Great Britain cap.

He’ll be joined by an exciting young team which includes a trio of medallists from the 2023 European Junior Championships – also in Belgrade – who are selected for their maiden senior GB team, including City of Leeds’ Leah Schlosshan, a double European Junior champion in the Women’s 200m Individual Medley across the previous two seasons.

Joshua Gammon (Bath University) defended his Men’s 200m Butterfly British title a few weeks ago and placed second in the 100m event to earn his call-up, Alexander Painter (Millfield) reached the 50m and 100m Freestyle finals in London and Fleur Lewis (Loughborough University) took British silver across both Women’s 800m and 1500m Freestyle events.

Swim England DiSE (Diploma in Sporting Excellence) alumni Calvin Fry and Bath Performance Centre athlete Jack Skerry complete the English contingent that are heading to Belgrade.

‘A key stepping stone’

Aquatics GB Head of Performance Development Alan Lynn is looking forward to seeing how each athlete fares in the European arena across both pool and marathon swimming programmes,

He said: “All ten of the athletes selected for the pool swimming team produced some brilliant performances at the recent Aquatics GB Swimming Championships, and showed that they could deliver big swims when it mattered, in a packed and intense competition environment.

“Heading into the summer, we know each swimmer will be looking to build on those swims to progress their experience and target season’s bests in Belgrade, when they will come up against a host of strong international athletes, including plenty who will be building towards the Olympics a few weeks down the line.

“This is a pool that holds fond memories for a few of this group after a fantastic European Juniors last July when we saw the likes of Leah, Matthew (Ward) and Holly (McGill) put in some outstanding swims, and hopefully that is something they can harness a year on.

“As for Hector, Leah Crisp and Toby in the marathon events, their focuses are very much on producing their best in Paris about seven weeks after the European Championships, so we know they will use this high-level racing opportunity as a key stepping stone towards the Olympics and to provide further indication of where they are at after some strong work in training over the months since February’s World Championships.”