University named as one of only two national centres for swimming

05 December 2013

The University features strongly in plans unveiled today by British Swimming.

Its Sports Training Village has been named as one of only two national centres for the sport in Great Britain as it continues to prepare for the Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

The British Gas GBR National Centre for Swimming at University of Bath will become a performance hub for the sport from the beginning of the new year.

The centre will grow from its current centre-based training group programme to a more all-encompassing approach to preparation, development and education for both athletes and coaches both within and from outside the centres.

National Performance Director for British Swimming Chris Spice is pleased to be able to start the Commonwealth Games year with the National Centres in place to support preparation of the home nations. The other centre will be at Loughborough.

“These new British Gas GBR National Centres for Swimming will be driven by a real ethos of learning and development for all of those athletes and coaches who have been identified as being able to achieve their potential on the international stage,” said Spice.

“Athletes and coaches both from within and from outside of the centres will be able to utilise world class facilities, sport science and medicine support as well as development and educational services within these unique performance environments.”

The National Centres will adopt an open door policy for athletes and coaches within the world class system and they will be invited to attend both performance and sport science testing programmes.

“We will be encouraging coaches and athletes to utilise the National Centres as they take on a performance hub role,” explained Spice.

“Athletes aligned to our programmes will be assigned to the National Centres for medical screening, performance analysis and coach education. It’s important to change the training environment and add fresh stimulus while expanding on knowledge and these centres allow us to do this.”

Stephen Baddeley, Director of Sport at the University of Bath, said: “We’re proud and excited to be named as hosts for one of British Swimming’s two National Centres.

“British Swimming is one of our key partners and we worked together closely on the development of the Bath Intensive Training Centre, which has become one of the most successful high performance centres in the country.

“Today’s announcement will take this relationship on to the next level and I’m confident the National Centre in Bath will play an important role in the development of successful British swimming teams for the Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.

“We offer a range of world-leading facilities on one site,” he added. “The wider role of the new National Centres is also particularly exciting given the University of Bath’s academic reputation and its consistently impressive performances in higher education surveys and ranking lists.”

Commenting on the announcement Head Coach David McNulty said: “It’s an honour and an absolute privilege to be head coach of the new national centre. Over the last five years we’ve established a centre of excellence at Bath around an unbelievable group of athletes.

“The National Centre now boasts a squad that includes eight Olympians, an Olympic silver medallist, six podium athletes and four podium potential athletes. We can now put the best with the best in a training environment on a daily basis.

“We have great staff in place, are positioned in a fantastic city have the support of a superb university, and I’m now ready to take the new centre to the next level of sporting excellence.”

Spice believes this new direction for British Swimming will provide increased support and performance research to a wider group of athletes.

“British Swimming felt this was an opportunity to refresh the elite end of the sport and in doing so we’re challenging ourselves to strive to get better.” said Spice.

“These will look and feel like National Centres which is vitally important as we need to provide the right environment within which to pursue excellence.

“We’ve made the environment much more challenging for both athletes and coaches in order that, collectively, we make the improvements that are necessary on the world stage.”

Coach education will also play a large part in the role of the National Centres and the appointment of a new Coach Education Manager in the new year will see the centres act a regional hubs to educate elite coaches of the future while working with the current crop.

The British Gas GBR National Centres for Swimming, Bath will continue to be lead by Head Coach Dave McNulty and supported by Assistant Coach Graeme Antwhistle.

 

 

 

The following athletes are currently based at:

British Gas GBR National Centre, Bath

Michael Jamieson Lizzie Simmonds
Andrew Willis Joe Roebuck
Chris Walker-Hebborn Rachel Williams
Sophie Allen Alfie Howes
Siobhan-Marie O’Connor Anne Bochmann
Jemma Lowe Calum Jarvis
Matthew Johnson Jonathan Carlisle

 

You can find out more about Team Bath on our website teambath.com

You can also follow Team Bath on Twitter at twitter.com/teambath or facebook.com/teambath

For further information please contact the Team Bath press office at Matchtight Ltd on 01225 383518 or press@matchtight.co.uk or 07831 755351

For further details contact Dave Richards, British Swimming Head of Communications, on 0778 992 6136, email dave.richards@swimming.org

 

 

 

Sponsors
Partners and Suppliers