THE 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo remain 19 months away. In swimming, age has rarely been a barrier. And for teenage hopefuls Scott McLay and Freya Anderson, even the relatively minor spoils to be gained at this weekend’s Scottish Short Course Championship in Edinburgh represent valuable experience.
At 19, McLay is a young man in a hurry. Miffed at missing out on competing at August’s European Championships in Glasgow after venturing to the Commonwealth Games – the qualifying event – as a relay specialist, he has converted disappointment into determination.
Among the ferocious group of tyros at the University of Stirling, he claimed a Scottish title in the 100 metres freestyle last night in coming second to Englishman David Cumberlidge. A hand waved in the air, heading into a pivotal year where the world championships in South Korea must be his ambition.
“I don’t want to miss out again,” he said. “I wish I’d been at the Europeans, and I was there shouting my team-mates on, but now I want to take it step by step. I need to improve my 100m free. My butterfly is coming on well on top of that. I’ll go through a process of getting better and better and hopefully I’ll be in the team for the worlds in both the individual and the relay.”
Of all of the UK’s prospects, it is Anderson whose potential attracts the greatest reverence. A former world junior champion, the 17-year-old from Cheshire poached a maiden senior individual medal at the Europeans but the intimidating manner of her victories yesterday in both the 50m and 400m freestyle finals underlined why some see her as having the potential to be on the podium in Tokyo.
“This time last year, I’d not raced because of a back injury, but that did me good,” she reflected. “I’m much further on now and I’m happier with how I’m going. I think that helped make me stronger, maybe even more committed. Watching my team-mates swim when I couldn’t was hard but I couldn’t wait to get back into training and competing.”
Ross Murdoch claimed his second Scottish record in two days to see off old foe Craig Benson in the 100m breaststroke final in a time of 57.29 seconds. Besting Michael Jamieson’s 200m mark today might be a hat-trick too far. “That is just a whole other level,” he said.
His University of Stirling team-mate Duncan Scott claimed his fourth and fifth titles of the meeting in the 200m butterfly and in the 4x50m free relay, fitting an exam into his Saturday schedule which was taken while sequestered within the building.
University of Edinburgh’s Tain Bruce shrunk the Scottish women’s 100m butterfly record to 57.15 sec while Aimee Willmott held off Kat Greenslade in the 200m backstroke final. In the heats, Stephen Clegg set a world record of 27.20 in the 50m S12 backstroke with fellow Paralympian Scott Quin lowering the world best in the SB14 100m breaststroke to 1:04.67.
Meanwhile, a lawsuit has been filed in California against swimming’s world governing body FINA with Hungary’s three-time Olympic champion Katinka Hosszu, along with Americans Tom Shields and Michael Andrew, claiming they are acting "on behalf of elite swimmers around the world" in alleging anti-competitive conduct. The move comes after a lucrative series run by the International Swimming League was abandoned ahead of its planned launch in Turin this month after competitors were threatened with bans from the world championships.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here