Swim Wales announced 114 swimmers and para swimmers to their National Squad Program for 2018-19 in September, led by notable names Georgia Davies, Alys Thomas and Chloe Tutton.
The Swim Wales National Squad Pathway is designed to provide appropriate levels of support to swimmers as they progress, with the underlying principle being that it should lead to systematic success and contribute to Swim Wales’ performance objective of putting swimmers on the British Swimming pathway and achieving medal success at major games.
There are four tiers to the pathway: National Skills Academy and Para Skills Academy, National Youth and Para Youth Development, National Elite and Para Elite Development and National Senior and Para Elite.
National Performance Director Ross Nicholas commented ‘It is with great pleasure that we announce these selections for the coming season. The 2017/18 season was a highly successful year on the international stage with significant medal success from Welsh swimmers at both the Commonwealth Games and European Championships. We hope that the programme activity in 2018/19 can contribute to continued international success this season and at the same time help our younger swimmers develop both their physical and mental skills as they progress as performance athletes.’
The National Senior Elite Squad consists of eleven athletes:
- Kathryn Greenslade
- Georgia Davies
- Chloe Tutton
- Alys Thomas
- Harriet Jones
- Harriet West
- Calum Jarvis
- Daniel Jervis
- Xavier Castelli
- Joseph Clark
- Daniel Jones
Davies won four medals at the European Championships this past August, including a gold and new European Record in the 50 back and another gold in the mixed medley relay, while Thomas had a pair of medals herself and Greenslade, Tutton and Jarvis also competed.
The full 114-member squad can be found on the Swim Wales website here.