Aquatics GB team take to the pool for World Short Course Championships

The curtain is set to come down on a memorable year of swimming as an Aquatics GB team start their six days of action at the World Aquatics Short Course Swimming Championships in Budapest today.

At the end of a year that brought five Olympic medals in the pool for GB – including a historic relay title defence –  it will be over to rising talent Amelie Blocksidge to get Britain’s World Short Course campaign underway on Tuesday (10th December) when she dives in for the heats of the Women’s 400m Freestyle.

Six GB swimmers are in opening-day action, with Blocksidge joined in competition by Eva Okaro (Women’s 50m Butterfly), Abbie Wood (Women’s 200m Individual Medley), Oliver Morgan (Men’s 100m Backstroke), Jacob Peters (Men’s 50m Butterfly) and Max Litchfield (Men’s 200m Individual Medley).

Both Blocksidge and Okaro come into the meet in fine form after fine tuning their World Championships preparations with National Winter Championships golds last week.

Okaro took both the 50m and 100m Freestyle senior golds whilst Blocksidge won both the senior and junior 1500m Freestyle crowns as they gained more valuable competition experience in Sheffield.

‘Enjoyable and insightful competition’

They now head to the meet in Budapest, alongside the remainder of the 10-strong British team, to take on a world-class field where there are some busy individual event programmes.

Wood (200m Freestyle, 200m IM and 400m IM), Morgan (50m, 100m and 200m Backstroke) and Angharad Evans (50m, 100m and 200m Breaststroke) are among those set to contest three events, while Litchfield is set to race in both individual medley events, the 200m Freestyle and the 400m Freestyle.

Peters, meanwhile, will line up in the 50m and 100m Butterfly and the Bath Performance Centre athlete is relishing the chance to represent GB again on the international stage.

He said: “I’m really looking forward to getting out to Budapest and giving it my best.

“I can’t wait to be around the other members of the team again – last season was a bit of a disappointment for me, so to be back on the team and surrounding myself with all the talent and the amazing athletes that Aquatics GB produce, it’s great.”

“I want to go there, enjoy myself, try to get the best out of what I’m capable of at the moment, and then hopefully there are a couple of finals and we can go from there. It’ll be really good to get myself round the team again, get morale high and then hopefully kick on for the rest of the season.”

Olympic silver medallist and 2021 World Short Course 50m Freestyle champion Ben Proud has withdrawn from the team and will not be competing in Budapest as he continues to build back into post-Olympic training.

July’s World Aquatics Championships in Singapore is the major focus for the swimming team in 2025, and new Head Coach Steven Tigg explained how the World Short Course Championships can help the athletes involved at this stage of the season.

He added: “We are really looking forward to bringing this team together and getting some valuable early-season racing under the belt as we begin a fresh Olympic cycle towards LA – with the first major focus being about building towards next summer’s World Aquatics Championships in Singapore.

“The World Short Course Championships are always an enjoyable and insightful competition opportunity, which provide a chance to fine-tune technical skills and routines in the high-performance arena.”

Every heats and finals session from Budapest will be available to watch live on the Eurovision Sport platformwith heats getting underway at 8am and finals at 4:30pm each day.  Watching on Eurovisionis free of charge, you just need to sign up on their website.

You can also find full results and start lists will via the World Aquatics website.