Early starts worth it for swim star

WHILE most people spent the few days before Christmas doing last-minute preparations, a group of teenage sporting stars in our region were getting up at 3.45am every day to hit the pool.

In the lead up to the festive period last month, our region's finest swimmers fitted six sessions into just three days to make up for the training they would miss while all the pools were shut across Hull.

The intense period of training even culminated in an energy sapping workout of 100 efforts of 100m with just 30 to 40 seconds rest between each – a session which lasted two-and-a-half hours from start to finish.

This is a measure of the dedication on show by the elite training squad at Kingston upon Hull Swimming Club and from their head coach Peter Richardson – who unlocked the facility at Ennerdale Leisure Centre to allow the squad to train from 5am.

One of the big stars of 2009 for the Kingston elite squad was Wolfreton School pupil Rachael Williamson.

The 14-year-old had a superb year and after topping the UK rankings in the 400m and 800m freestyle for her age, she was picked to compete for Great Britain at the European Youth Olympics in Finland.

The youngster had high hopes of doing well at the event and after finishing sixth in the final of the 400m, she brought home bronze medal from the 800m.

These achievements went a long way in helping Williamson scoop the HotShot of the Year Award for 2009.

But that is all in the past for the Anlaby Common resident, who now has her attentions firmly fixed on competing well at the British Championships in March in Sheffield.

A good showing there will once again put Williamson into the Great Britain squad – this time for the European Junior Championships, which also take place in Finland later this summer.

She said: "The British Championships is my main aim, as it is the biggest event of the year and from here the selectors will pick the team for the Europeans.

"My training has been upped in the last few months and is slowly getting harder and I hope all this extra work pays off as I would really like to get into the European Junior team a year early, as I can do the event again next year.

"I just want to go out there and swim to the best of my ability and see where that gets me."

Williamson admits her main aim is to get a place in the 400m and 800m in Helsinki.

Her best time of 4min 20.72sec for 400m is the fifth best time ever achieved by a 14-year-old in the history of British swimming, while she is seventh in the 800m on the all-time rankings for age groups with 8min 56.73sec.

The HotShots champion will be competing in her third British Championships and will also take part in the 200m freestyle and 200m butterfly competitions after achieving the qualifying times for those events as well.

In her heats she could square off against Olympic stars Jo Jackson and Rebecca Adlington – whose aims will be slightly different to Williamson as they go in search of a place on the GB team for the World Championships and the England team for the Commonwealth Games.

And while Williamson is a long way off matching the best in the country at senior level, the extra training she is doing is helping her improve with every race – although even she admits the Christmas Eve 100 times 100m session was a killer.

She added: "That Christmas Eve session was probably the hardest session I have ever had to do.

"It was difficult to get out of the pool after as my legs and arms were killing me and I ached all over.

"After that sort of session you hurt a lot and just want to go to sleep but I had my little sister come and wake me up the next day because it was Christmas Day.

"You get used to it after a while and your body learns to recover better, but the early starts we had were not easy – especially when we had to plunge into what felt like a cold pool at five in the morning."