Swim England Members
Team GB and Paralympics GB athletes share their favourite part of training
September 10, 2024After a summer of success in the pool, some of our Olympic and Paralympic stars have shared their favourite parts of training.
The group of 30 swimmers, 27 para-swimmers, 11 divers and the artistic swimming duet of Kate Shortman and Izzy Thorpe collected 43 medals from their time in the French capital, inspiring and representing the nation on the worlds biggest stage.
Here, our Paris 2024 heroes have revealed their favourite set which helped them on their way to glory in the French capital.
Tom Dean
“I like race pace sets, they’re the main thing. Locking in at 50’s at race pace, I could do that all day – love it!”
Honey Osrin
“I do really like the hard sessions. I do like a heart rate and race pace kind of set. That just includes lots of 50’s and 150’s. It’s really, really tough but it’s good.”
Kate Shortman
“Probably just when we’re working really hard. I think with artistic swimming there’s a lot of breakdown and detail work that needs to happen. But for me I like doing strength and conditioning and the speed swimming that keeps us fit.”
Anthony Harding
“I’ve got a gymnastics background so I love doing any gym and tumbling in the dryland but in the pool I love the 109 – front four 1/2 somersaults – that’s one of my favourite dives.”
Grace Harvey
“I love anything that starts with race warm up because that is my happy place. And my race warm up has not changed since I was 11, well the first part, anyways. It’s 200 free, 200 back, a 100 skull smiling. Because smiling treats the brain, makes you happy, makes you relax and makes you want it.”
Jacob Whittle
“It’s a hard one because some of the best sets that I’ve ever done are really painful. The best set that I’ve done, I wouldn’t call it my favourite, but for me it was 6x50m’s off four minutes at race pace just trying to build lactate.
“But we also do one where it’s 12x50m’s off three minutes at race pace – it’s basically start at 22 point and then hold on for dear life. I’m sure you can imagine what the last one looks like.”
Scarlett Mew Jensen
“I love all of it. I’m a bit of a gym nut. I really like the grit and the hard work and the sweat. So pre-season for me, the heavy weights and the cardio. I think people won’t believe but that is true!”
Laura Stephens
“That’s hard, because I really enjoy the hard training, so it’s got to be 10x200m Butterfly! That’s my favourite set!”
Will Ellard
“It’s definitely the race pace stuff. The more rest I get the better I feel because I just feel better mentally and physically when you get more rest and recovery.”
Max Litchfield
“We do so many it’s hard to choose. I quite like doing pace stuff. I like doing aerobic stuff but when it’s fast and kind of race pace, it’s more specific to what I’m going to be doing when I’m racing.
“It’s always nice to swim fast, especially when you can do it in training. It’s all going well and it’s going to be even better when it gets to race day. So yeah, any set where I get to put a suit on and swim really fast. It just gets you going and gets you ready for whatever meet you’ve got coming up.”