Swim England Talent Pathway Selection Criteria for 2022/2023 released

Swim England’s Talent Pathway Selection Criteria for the 2022-23 season has been released and for the first time the Swim England swimming and para-swimming talent teams have merged together to create one programme.

The strategic goal of Swim England Talent is to create a system that will identify, support and enhance the development of athletes for the Olympic, Paralympic and Commonwealth Games of the future.

Programme activities are designed to engage with swimmers whose age and stage in the ‘England Talent Pathway’ continues on the trajectory into World Class Programmes and International representation.

Each area of the national pathway is detailed within the guidelines and outlines how athletes are selected into the national framework.

The criteria explains the six steps of the Swim England Talent Pathway from the County Development Programme to the Senior Performance Squad.

The Swim England talent team will work with counties, regions and British Swimming/Para-Swimming to help develop activities to further enhance the athletes daily training environment, enabling swimmers and coaches to have continued support along their journey.

‘We firmly believe this will add so much value to both pathways’

Swim England’s Head of Swimming Talent, Richard Blackshaw, said the team is proud to have developed the new criteria.

He said: “The Swim England pathway provides a concurrent set of opportunities for development for England’s swimmers and also all the support network that works with the athletes from coaches, SSSM practitioner and team managers at all levels of development from county level of 11 years of age right through to our performance squad of senior swimmers.

“This year will see some new initiatives including the integration of Para and Olympic swimming.

“The national swimming talent team have taken the decision to merge the swimming and para-swimming pathways and will fully integrate with bespoke aspects when and where required.

“This is an initiative that is incredibly exciting, and one the team are proud to have developed that we firmly believe will add so much value to both pathways.”