Disability swimmers continue summer of success for British teams

With the London 2012 Summer Olympics now less than two years away, it has been an encouraging summer for British sport, with record medal hauls at both the European Athletics Championships in Barcelona and the European Swimming Championships in Budapest. That trend has continued at this week’s IPC World Swimming Championships in Eindhoven, where Great Britain’s disability swimming team finished with an impressive tally of 18 gold medals.

In total, 12 British athletes won individual gold at the championships, including four for 15-year old Eleanor Simmonds to add to her double gold at the Beijing Paralympics. She set a new world record in winning the S6 100m freestyle:

I am on such a high right now. I have won four gold medals and I am so happy. I haven’t broken that world record since 2009 and I feel really good to have done it here. It was good to come into the race and get the gold and back up my success from Beijing.

Other winners included Sascha Kindred, twice a gold medalist in Beijing, who continued his winning streak in the 200m individual medley, and Louise Watkin in the S9 50m freestyle, who beat South Africa’s Natalie du Toit into second place.

On the final day yesterday, Daniel Pepper added gold in the S14 200m freestyle to his earlier win in the 100m breaststroke:

I didn’t think that I would win that race but I put my head down and have come away with gold. That gold was quite unexpected. I just knew I had to focus and if I did then I would have success. I am really happy with the way this week has gone. I think it has been so good and my races went to plan.

Congratulations to the entire team, from whom we can once again expect a wealth of great performances at the 2012 Paralympics.

The 2012 Summer Olympics will be hosted by London from 27 July to 12 August 2012, with the Summer Paralympics taking place between 29 August and 9 September.

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