Great Success at European Juniors

Five medals and two British records from the 2012 European Junior Championships now make their journey from Antwerp to Plymouth courtesy of three Plymouth Leander athletes who won a magnificent one gold, three silver and one bronze between them.

Top of the tree is Joe Patching, European Junior Champion over 200m Backstroke, his breathtaking performance seeing him smash through the two-minute barrier for the first time taking gold in 1:59.45. “I’m absolutely speechless,” said Patching. “I’ve broken the two minute barrier which was my primary goal, but my second goal was to win the gold for the team and I managed to do both. The Italian was coming back hard on me in the last 50 but I just thought to myself ‘This is my day, I’m not going to let him pass’ and I swum through it. Now I get to stand on the podium and hear our national anthem - I’m so happy and so relieved.”

Joe was to also claim bronze as he led out the Great Britain 400m Medley relay on the final day of the meet, with earlier performances also seeing him take fourth in the 100m Backstroke (56.04).

Ben Proud’s debut Great Britain selection saw him take silver in the 50m Butterfly in a new British Age Record of 24.11, whilst his fourth place in the 50m Freestyle was agonisingly close to the medals but again in a British Age record of 22.70. Ironically, both of Ben Proud’s records were formerly in possession of two of PL’s current athletes prior to Antwerp – Antony James in the 50m Butterfly and James Burden in the 50m Freestyle.  The Plymouth Leander swimmer said: “I was just focusing on my time and it’s paid off. To get a new PB and a silver at the European Juniors is just a fantastic achievement and being cheered on by my team really made the difference.”

Two medals were the order of the day for Grace Vertigans as she helped Britain power their way to silver in the 400m Freestyle relay and bronze (swimming the Butterfly leg) in the 400m Medley relay. Grace was one of the busiest swimmers on the British team, claiming fifth in 100m Freestyle (56.08) and a further fifth in the 50m Freestyle (25.93). Grace was also to swim a best time to make the semi-finals of both the 100m Butterfly (1:02.11) and 50m Butterfly (28.02).

The Plymouth Leander contingent at the meet was taken to four with the addition of Lindsay Dunn as one of the GBR coaching staff whilst in Belgium. All three athletes will be straight back into the training pool in preparation for their last meet of the season, the British National Youth Championships in Sheffield 17th – 21st July.