British Championships 2022 - Report

The British Championships are the flagship domestic event of the year, the racing is taking place at the Ponds Forge International Sports Centre from 5th-10th April 2022, and plays a key a role in the qualification process for June's World Championships in Budapest - the first of three major international meets across the year after an historic 2021 for Britain's swimmers.

The six-day meet is also envisaged to help team selections for the remaining senior and junior international meets in 2022, with British and Home Nation athletes targeting big performances to get them on teams for the world stage.

Winsford Swim Team had 6 swimmers racing over the week, with Lois Inch (200 Breastroke), Amy Kenworthy (800 Free), Ethan Wright (200 Butterfly), Adam Blackshaw (200 Butterfly) racing on the Wednesday and Carys Roberts (50 Free), and Ethan Wright (400 IM) racing on the following day, we also had Josh Wilson finishing off our races on the Saturday with the 50 Freestyle.

Due to the large number of swimmers taking part from across Great Britain the days were split into 3 sessions with heats taking place both in the morning and early afternoon and then the finals in the evening. So lots and lots of very exciting racing for everyone to watch as all sessions were live streamed so all people could watch from anywhere in the world.

For all our swimmers it was their first taste of British Championship racing and all were looking forward to the challenge of racing the best swimmers in Britain, including Adam Peaty, Ben Proud and James Guy to name a few. Over the 3 days we were in action all swimmers both full time Winsford and our University swimmers had some solid performances. All results were encouraging especially after a long 3 weekends of racing in the lead into the meet. Also what was priceless for all our swimmers was the experience of racing at the highest level national meet of the year. This no doubt will help our swimmers into the remaining meets of the season and into the National Summer Championships which take place at Ponds Forge in July and August. With a very hard block of training I know all our swimmers will swim very fast when we travel to Sheffield in the summer.

Well done to Lois, Amy, Carys, Ethan, Adam and Josh for qualifying for the British Championships, and travelling to Sheffield to battle it out against the top swimmers in the UK. Also a special mention to Jay Cushen who unfortunately couldn’t race but qualified for the 50 Butterfly, and also to Henry Oliver who also qualified for the 50 Butterfly but had his entry rejected due to the high number of swimmers in Sheffield. The results for all our swimmers were good, and was a super experience for everyone, it will no doubt be very beneficial in the years to come when they transition into senior swimmers.

Link to all results: https://results.swimming.org/swimming/results/2022/bschamps/

Thanks

Dan.