Team Bath Judo’s Ben Fletcher will find out for certain in the next two weeks whether he has qualified for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. Fletcher wasn’t able to reproduce the form he had shown while finishing a career-high seventh in Azerbaijan the previous week as he was beaten by home judoka Viktor Demyanenko in the first round of the men’s -100kg competition at the Almaty Grand Prix in Kazakhstan. But despite the setback, Fletcher...
University of Bath-based athlete Paul Blake continued his preparations for the Rio 2016 Paralympic Games by producing an impressive win in Spain over the weekend. The triple World Champion, making his second international appearance of the season, clocked 54.98 to take victory in the T36 400m at the XI International Meeting Kern Pharma Grand Prix in Sauleda. Blake is coached by Rob Ellchuk at the Sports Training Village. University of Bath Business Masters graduate Lawrence...
Former Team Bath swimmer Sascha Kindred will compete at his sixth Paralympic Games after being named in a 31-strong ParalympicsGB squad for Rio 2016. Kindred (pictured) won two gold medals, plus a silver and bronze, at the Sydney 2000 Games while based at the Sports Training Village. That was his second Paralympics, having made his debut at Atlanta 1996, and he has won six titles in total during the past 20 years. Also heading to...
Pentathlon GB’s Jamie Cooke gave his chances of Rio 2016 Olympic Games qualification a significant boost when he became the first British man to win gold at the UIPM World Cup Final in Sarasota, Florida. It was the University of Bath-based athlete’s second international success in a month, following on from his World Cup victory in Kecskemét, Hungary. Biology graduate Freyja Prentice also claimed a top-six finish in the women’s competition in the United States...
Team Bath Judo’s Ben Fletcher produced his best-ever Grand Prix result in Azerbaijan on Sunday to maintain his push for a Rio 2016 Olympic Games qualification place. World number ten Jose Armenteros was among the judoka Fletcher overcame on his way to a seventh-placed finish in the men’s -100kg weight category in Baku. Hungary’s Miklos Cirjenics was runner-up, moving him into the automatic qualification places for Rio, but Fletcher still holds one of two continental...
University of Bath-based athlete Eilidh Doyle got the Rio 2016 Olympic season off to a flying start as she set the fastest women’s 400m hurdles time of the year so far. Doyle, nee Child, clocked 54.53 to finish ahead of Bahrain's Kemi Adekoya and reigning Commonwealth champion Kaliese Spencer of Jamaica at the first Diamond League meeting of the season in Doha. It was a fastest-ever season opener for European champion Doyle, who is coached by...
Pentathlon GB’s Jamie Cooke is hoping it will be déjà vu all over again when he goes looking for more Rio 2016 Olympic Games qualification points at this weekend's World Cup Final in the United States. Cooke enjoyed a timely confidence boost when he had ‘one of those perfect pentathlon days’ while winning World Cup gold in Kecskemét, Hungary earlier this month. It was his second success in Kecskemét, with his other World Cup victory coming...
University of Bath-based wheelchair fencer Piers Gilliver won his fifth World Cup medal of the Rio 2016 Paralympic Games qualifying campaign after another impressive display in Canada. Epee bronze in Laval maintained the 21-year-old’s ranking as number one in the world and all but wrapped up qualification for Rio with just two tournaments – the European and American Championships – to go. Gilliver, who went into his latest competition as the top seed, won all...
With 100 days to go until the 2016 Olympic Games, University of Bath-based swimmer Jazz Carlin can say she has already struck Rio gold. Carlin, part of the British Swimming National Centre squad at the Sports Training Village, was invited by The Royal Mint to mark the 100-day countdown by striking an official Team GB gold-edition 50p coin. It comes a week after the Commonwealth champion was officially selected by Team GB for this summer’s...
Four Rio-bound swimmers based at the University of Bath and two targeting the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games have been selected in the Great Britain squad for next month’s LEN European Championships in London. Jazz Carlin, Siobhan-Marie O’Connor, Chris Walker-Hebborn and Chemical Engineering graduate Andrew Willis are among the 26 Team GB swimmers who will compete at the home Europeans as part of their Olympic Games preparations. British Swimming National Performance Director Chris Spice said: “This event...
