A team of four Irish swimmers flew out this morning to compete at the third meet of the new Para Swimming World Series in Sheffield, taking place over the coming days (April 27th – 30th). The team features Rio Paralympic bronze medallist Ellen Keane, as well as fellow Paralympian fourteen year old Nicole Turner. They will be joined by upcoming young swimmers Barry Mc Clements from Newtownards, and UCD’s Patrick Flanagan.
At the opening meet in the series last month in Copenhagen the Irish team came away with four medals; a gold and a silver each for Keane, andMc Clements. Bringing together some of the biggest competitions on the global calendar, the World Series will take in five countries across Europe and the Americas between March-July, leading into the 2017 World Championships in Mexico City in October.
Speaking about the meet Irish team manager Hayley Burke said; “We’re looking forward to racing this weekend in Sheffield. As British nationals and a major open this meet has always been particularly competitive and with it promoted to a World series it will be even more so with additional countries attending. Following our good showing in Copenhagen both Nicole and Barry are ranked second so far in the Junior rankings for the World Series; all four will be keen to race well across their events and try and make several finals.”
All athlete’s results at each World Series edition will be calculated using a standardised points system via an online virtual competition platform. This will ensure that the overall World Series winner will be the best performing athlete over the duration of the series, meaning that every performance counts.
Racing gets underway tomorrow morning with the heats beginning at 9.45am, and a live stream should be available here
