By Matt Hardy
It’s a sink or swim week for Britain’s Olympic and Paralympic hopefuls in the pool as the British Championships offer qualification to Paris.
The winners of each event at the London Aquatics Centre in Stratford will automatically qualify for the 2024 Summer games.
The other allocated spot will be chosen at a later date by British Swimming’s performance director Chris Spice and head coach Bill Furniss.
The likes of Adam Peaty will look to qualify this week alongside Laura Stephens, Freya Colbert and Paralympic hopeful Poppy Maskill.
But the 200m men’s freestyle is where most eyes will be, with Olympic champion Tom Dean, Tokyo silver medallist Duncan Scott and 2023 world champion Matt Richards vying for two spots.
“It is scary because if it goes wrong, you are not going [to the Olympic Games] – it is that difficult,” Richards told the BBC.
“But I can’t wait. I will be really excited that morning. It will then be about trying to keep it cool and stay composed ready for the race.
“I love the rivalries between us all, “We’re all really good friends first, which makes it quite special.
“But when we are in the water, we’re all competitors and we all want to beat each other.
“There is a lot of pressure on it, but at the same time we all want to see each other do well. Maybe just one one hundredth less well than yourself.”
Olympic Games advantage?
“They’ve made a bit of a leap forward so that’s quite exciting. It is such a fine detail between who can be first and second that it’s reassuring knowing how good this suit is,” Scott told City A.M. last year.
“If you put on an old suit and compare it to the Fastskin 2.0, it’s huge: the compression and how tight it is, how flexible it is, it has that shiny feeling where the water just drips off it. I feel lucky and I love it.”
The championships start on Tuesday and run through until 7 April.
