Day five heats of the World Para Swimming European Championships saw 11 British athletes in heats action with eight successfully booked into finals.
Alice Tai, last night’s S8 100m back gold medallist and European champion, was back in action on the fifth day of racing in Dublin.
She cruised away from the field and clocked the quickest time of the morning in the Women’s S8 100m Freestyle heats. 1:08.43 secured her the preferred centre lane for the final.
Reflecting on her heats swim, Tai said, “I’m happy, it felt good for this morning. I eased off in the last 50m so hopefully this evening I’ll be close to my PB.
“It’s probably my favourite event. I feel like it’s progressed a lot in the last few years. At the Commonwealth Games being touched out of gold in 0.05 seconds, it encouraged me to look at my stroke and pick the tiny things which might be slowing me down.”
Teammate Megan Richter also qualified for the final, she clocked the fifth fastest time of the morning to set a new season’s best of 1:12.65
Great Britain has three swimmers through to the final of the Women’s S6 400m Freestyle tonight. Multi Paralympic Champion Eleanor Simmonds will lead the charge for the medals as she ranked second with her time of 5:30.08.
Simmonds later said, “I'm really happy with that. It's a lot faster time than I expected, it felt really good, but you never know what anyone will turn out tonight. It's everything to play for.
“My silver in the breast stroke was unexpected. Tonight I'll give it everything. It's my last race here so will see how it goes.
“I learnt a lot from my 200 IM, at the time I was devastated. Looking back now, I know what I did wrong, and what I need to improve on. It's made me really motivated for September now, and fully focussed to train hard.”
Hot on her heels will be double 2018 European Champion Maisie Summers-Newton, her heat time 5:33.15.
Grace Harvey, who claimed her first senior international medal last night, went 5:38.10 and progressed in fourth.
Toni Shaw returned to the pool again in Dublin and this time she went in the heats of the Women’s SM9 200m IM.
After posting one of the fastest time of the morning Shaw explained, “You can’t control what anyone else is going to do, so I took it steady.
“Two people were DQ’d in the heat before me, so it ended up going to a straight final and I just did my own thing. No point putting it all out there.”
She qualified second fastest with a time of 2:48.88 as she produced a controlled morning session swim.
Lewis White was the solo British para-swimmer to progress through to the final of the Men’s SM9 200m Individual Medley after three men took to Dublin’s National Aquatic Centre pool.
White’s time of 2:24.21 was also a new personal best time for the Commonwealth medallist.
“For me, I like to go out and do the heats as I would swim a final,” said White. “I don’t feel that I’m quite at the age where I have to worry about pacing myself just yet.
“At the end of the day my focus is just trying to PB and that’s what I did. I’ve had a good week so far, so hopefully I can just continue to do so.
“Now I’ll go away, get some food, maybe sleep but generally rest and ensure I don’t exert myself in anyway before the final and then I can come back and hopefully go faster tonight.”
Jacob Leach and Ollie Hynd also featured in the Men’s SM9 IM heats and they ranked 10th and 12 respectively and did not progress to the final on this occasion.
Michael Jones went in his first event of the Dublin 2018 championships, the Men’s S7 50m Freestyle.
Jones clocked a season’s best of 31.58 to secure his place in the final of the Men’s S7 50m Freestyle final this evening.
Andrew Mullen went in the Men’s S5 50m Freestyle, he finished third in his heat and posted a time of 36.83, just over 0.4 of a second of his 2018 season’s best.
His final ranking of ninth saw him miss out on a place in tonight’s final by 0.05 of a second.
Day five finals session will also see two swimmers compete in straight final events, Tully Kearney will go in the Women’s S5 50m Freestyle and Rebecca Redfern will race in the Women’s S13 100m Backstroke
For results and times from day five heats of Dublin 2018 click here