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Clean sweep of top 10s for British juniors in Belgrade

Great Britain’s synchronised swimmers secured a clean sweep of top 10 finishes at the 2017 European Junior Championships in Belgrade, Serbia.

The Brits improved on their Solo, Team and Free Combination results from 2016 while they scored higher than last year in all four events.

Duet Kate Shortman and Isabelle Thorpe (both City of Bristol) were the first finalists of the competition, finishing 10th.

The pair are competing as Great Britain’s senior duet this season, and will head to their maiden World Championships later in July.

And the teenagers’ improvement from last year’s European Junior Championships was clear to see, as they added more than seven points to their overall tally.

Shortman and Thorpe scored 79.5667 for their free routine in the final, finishing on 156.5185.

There was similar improvement in the Team event, as the Brits added five points to their score from 2016.

They also improved a position from last year, finishing ninth on 151.4868 after scoring 78.2667 for their free routine in the final.

Kate Shortman breaks 80 points in Solo

Shortman impressed again in the Solo event, jumping up two places from her 11th last year.

The 15-year old edged past the 80 point marker for her free routine in the final, scoring 80.0333 to finish on 157.0976.

The full squad closed the competition with another mature performance in the Free Combination.

Having finished ninth in 2016, the squad improved to eighth in Europe in Belgrade, scoring 79.3333.

A big improvement on last year

Swim England Synchro Manager Karen Thorpe, who was Team Manager at the competition alongside coaches Olivia Federici and Paola Basso, admitted the results show the young team is heading in the right direction.

“I was really pleased with the results,” said Thorpe. “It was a big improvement on last year in terms of performance in all events.

“It shows the work we have been doing to develop our technical expertise and execution scores.

“All our competitors are pushing hard to improve so it is not easy to improve the ranking but the improvement on scores is credit to the hard work of our coaches and athletes.”

Image credit: Synchro Serbia Facebook

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