TBT - Commonwealth Games 2014 and My Breakout year.

This is a story of my first international swimming competition, but also, my experiences of the first time I moved programmes to a University Programme.

In 2013, I had applied for University and my first choice was the University of Bath. I had previously been there before, and swam at a couple of competitions there, which ignited my passion and desire to train there in the future. The thing that got me was walking into the Sports Training Village (STV) you were always above the gym, which you could look into from a balcony. I always thought that was really cool as a kid growing up.

My programme before was Swim Bournemouth, and although it was a phenomenal training environment, the issue for me was that I lived a 70-mile round trip distance away from the pool, so I could only attend 5-6 sessions at that pool. I was fortunate enough to still be on good terms with my home coach at the time, so I was swimming 7 times and in the gym once a week at that point.

Fast forward and I acquire the grades to get onto the Sport Performance course at the University. I was very fortunate, as Bath University is a very prestigious University, the grades that you normally needed were 3As or the equivalent. The Sport Performance course luckily was one of the only courses to require less than this, and luckily, it was 3Cs. my grades were BBC and was on my way!

The relevance behind my move to Bath is once I had moved there, my opportunity to train more increased dramatically. I stepped up to swimming 10x and dryland training of Strength and Conditioning 3 times per week. The impact that this had on my swimming performance was evident as I started being able to take lots of time off my personal bests.

The training at Bath was grueling, but whilst my body could handle it I really started to improve fast. I went into the year ranked 20th Nationally in the 1500m free with a personal best of 16:01 and a 400m freestyle pb of 4:00.

Fast forward to trials and before the meet had even started, I had swam a 15:34 and 3:54 untapered and unrested, I believed I had a very good swim in me at Commonwealth Trials.

Preparing for the 1500m free, I had had an awesome meet so far. I had knocked 5 seconds off my 400free personal best and placed 4th, narrowly missing out on a Commonwealth spot, as well as placing 6th in the 200m butterfly final, a preamble to this becoming my main event again in the future. With another second and a half personal best.

The heat of the 1500m free comes along and I am cruising it, and I place 2nd in my heat with a 15:23, qualifying 3rd or 4th for the final, but I knew there was more to come. I remember getting told off after the heat by one of the coaches for sprinting the last 50, as I by far and away had the fastest last 50 split, his argument being that I could have wasted energy for the final the next night. However, I was confident, and I didn’t think this would affect me too much, I just wanted to get racing and go faster.

The 1500m free final was set up to be a banger, Daniel Fogg was the fastest seed by quite a way, he had qualified for the Olympics in 2012 and had been on good form as of recently. I was seeded well but the heats are a completely different game to the finals, so I knew I would just have to give it my best shot.

In the final, I split my first 500 in a 5:06, rather slow compared to the rest of the field. For context, the 3 boys up front went out sub 5minutes, I was hanging on in around 6th, but my coach and I had a plan, and the first 500 was never our focus of the race. The second 500 I started making my move, I turned at 1000 in 10:12, splitting a faster 5:04 on that previous 500m. I had moved myself up into 4th place and was beginning to gain on The 3rd place swimmer, catching at roughly 1.5 seconds per 50.

I had more to give, I kept picking it up, and before I knew it I was alongside 3rd place, and then alongside 2nd place. I could see my team going crazy, they knew that if I could hold on I could qualify for the Commonwealth Games, and they were willing me on as much as possible.

In the end, Daniel Fogg won. With the only sub-15minute swim in the field, a HUGE goal for every distance swimmer in the world. But I had placed 2nd, in a 15:12.70. I had finished the race as well as I could and it was one of the most sensational feelings I have ever felt. I had never medalled at National age groups, with my best finish being 4th twice, and I had just medalled at British Senior Championships, what an experience.

One thing I remember from the next few months was the whirlwind of it all. We had the kitting out procedure, where we all got our kit and it was a celebration over anything else, but also I remember a hell of a lot of hard work in the interim before we made it to the Commonwealth Games Holding camp.

The holding camp was at the London Aquatics Centre, the home of where the Olympic games had been just 2 years earlier. There was still an air of awesomeness around the centre, and working with my prescribed coach was very exciting preparing for the games. I remember that I shared a room at the camp with Adam Peaty, little did we know what he would go onto be! All I remember is him probably thinking I was a lunatic as I was trying to learn our national anthem, Jerusalem for the initiations that were taking place for all first time Commonwealth Games Qualifiers, which was a cracking experience.

About a week after our arrival, we flew up to Glasgow and experienced the race pool and athletes village. One thing that stood out to me back then was how clean it was. There was a cleaning station to wash your hands, but upon exiting the toilets after doing that there was a second wall of hand sanitiser! Every athlete carried their own bottle of hand sanitiser also, apparently sickness bugs at the Competitions are everywhere, so it was always better to be safe than sorry.

It was so cool walking through the village and seeing the athletes, but what was cooler was that you were one of them. The team atmosphere was great and everyone wanted what was best for each other.

The MAIN thing that blew me away was on day 1 of the competition. It was the finals session and I have still, to this day never experienced a crowd quite like it. The event that particularly stood out to me was the 200m breaststroke. Of the 8 finalist, 7 of them were British, and the top 2 seeds were Scottish, I honestly would not have been surprised if the roof had lifted off the building with how crazy the crowd were for that race in particular, especially when Ross Murdoch and Michael Jamieson went 1-2 for Scotland! Even though it was not my memory for racing, it is still a memory I will always hold dear to myself!

I was not racing until day 6, I was one of the last swimmers up, but being buoyed on by the amount of success the team was having really boosted my energy. I wanted to be a part of that success, in whatever form that looked like.

My race day comes and in the heat at 500m I am hanging on to the lead pack just, but by 1000 they have started to pull away abit. I ended up placing 4th in that heat, in a time of 15:10, still another personal best, but now I was in the danger zone to not make the final. I had an anxious 15minute wait to see if I had made it through or not.

LUCKILY, I had, but in 8th place. only 3 swimmers from the last heat had beaten my time, so I was very lucky.

The final comes, and I am determined to do better, so determined, infact that when I am inevitably let out to go to the start blocks, as I was the first swimmer out, I had gone to the wrong lane! All the excitement had got the best of me, and even all my swim team signalling me to move over did not click in my brain! It took for the guy who was supposed to be in my lane to say something for me to realise!

In the final, I place 6th, in a better time than the heat; 15.06. A big result considering I had not saved any energy from the heat, I had swum the race much better and refused to be as passive, which played into my favour.

It is an experience I will always hold dear to my heart, but there were also many lesssons learnt for future competitions, something that I perhaps didn’t quite understand until 5 or 6 years later when I finally got back on top of why I swam in the first place.

This was a simpler time for me in my swimming career. At this stage, my journey had been linear, with success and improvements coming at most times of asking, little did I know or understand the injury struggles, the confidence woes and accepting the ups and downs of the swimming journey for what they were, were going to start as soon as a year later.

Now I know that I swim best when I:

- Take everything in and enjoy it for what it is

- Take the experience as a celebration and an achievement to be there, even if hungry for more.

- To swim for me, and to enjoy every minute of what I have got and what I can offer

- The most key one I probably only realise now, to BELIEVE in myself and my ability.

To add, I wouldn't have been able to swim and compete as well as I did without the help of my then coach, Mark Skimming, Who basically had to take on the role of my Dad for how much of a liability I was at that stage of my life, As well as my friends and family who helped me get there.