A DAY IN THE LIFE AT AGB CHAMPS | ATHLETES, COACHES AND FANS + WE WON THE INFLUENCER RELAY!!! (sort of)

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Hello and welcome to another episode of The Weekly Freestyle.

You join me, your host Alex Sutton.

On my first morning at Champs, it's a Thursday morning.

I'm making my way to the beautiful London Aquatic Centre

with the ex-Olympic stadium in the background.

Well, I guess it will always be the Olympic stadium.

As I say, it's a Thursday morning, as I speak to you now,

looking forward to a number of great events not only today.

Obviously, earlier in the week as well, I've really enjoyed those too.

So I'll be reflecting on those.

And also later to come in the week two.

But I thought I'd take you along.

We can see who we can find in East London, in Stratford,

in and around the pool.

And apologies if today's episode is a bit of a mishmash

because that's how we like it at Champs.

But you know, let the swimmers do the talking as such in the pool.

And as I say, yeah, let's see who we can find.

Catch you in a bit.

So first thing to first, as I said, this interview might be a little bit of a mashup.

But I actually managed to catch a few moments with Josh Giammon

after his incredible 50-fly swim and the saw him take the title.

So let's get over to Josh now.

I have the pleasure of being joined on the weekly freestyle

by the newly crowned British champion in the 50-butterfly.

Josh Giammon, Josh, thank you so much for dropping on the podcast.

I'm sure there's a lot of emotion and just still riding high off such a great week

and race in particular for you there.

Firstly, congratulations.

And secondly, is that the most emotion you've ever felt after one of your racers?

Hey Alex, yeah, thank you so much for having me.

Yeah, I definitely say so.

I think obviously leaving it till day six on such a massive week of racing

is never advisable.

It was definitely challenging the whole week.

I didn't race very well, my 200 or my 100,

which obviously put a little bit more pressure on to that.

50 on the last day,

meaning that kind of I had to achieve that qualification time otherwise.

I wasn't going anywhere.

I didn't have any summer meets.

So yeah, I think mostly the emotion came from the fact that I knew what was riding on it.

As you can probably imagine,

but yeah, it was obviously not ideal the fact that I had to wait till that last day.

Knowing that I ended up getting the time was just such a massive relief

and such a massive weight off my shoulders.

I mean, when you put it like that, Josh, I can feel,

I even now I can feel the pressure that you had on your shoulders for your final race of the

meet as you say with so much riding on it, your whole summer riding on it in a swimming sense.

You speak about the pressure.

Is that something you can prepare for?

I know obviously you had your trusted teammate Jacob in the lane next.

You I can imagine that you guys go head to head to head a lot in training

under the guidance of your coach Dave.

A head of that final swim, were you drawing on things that you've done in training to deliver

or is that something you've just got to pull out of pull out the bag on the day?

Yeah, absolutely.

You know, pressure is something that we have to deal with as athletes.

I think for me, I'm still quite well, I hope in the early stage of my career where

I haven't had to deal necessarily with too much pressure because

it's I've kind of always been on that kind of lower end of the international scene,

especially over the last few years.

So, you know, the pressure from the pressure side of things,

I haven't actually had to deal with that much of it up until

last week.

And obviously, yeah, there was a lot riding on it.

I hadn't done what I needed to do in the 200 or the 100.

Had some really disappointing swims.

Kind of the training I was doing didn't reflect my racing at all,

which is obviously extremely frustrating.

But there's nothing you can really do.

I could I kind of just had to kind of forget, move on and just focus on the next day.

And you know, I had to do that twice.

I did that for the 200 to then focus on the 100.

And then again, when I didn't do so well on the 100, I had to pick myself up and go again

for the 50, but you know, my support staff around me are so, so good.

They were so helpful.

They were there for me if I needed it.

Kind of they gave me the space when I needed it as well.

And yeah, you know, training alongside Jacob is incredible.

You know, we push each other in training.

We do kind of very different.

Not training models, but very different in terms of like amount of volume and amount of intensity

across a week.

My gym sessions are very different, but when we eventually come to the speed stuff,

we cross paths and you know, we push each other on the dives, the underwater's.

So he's, you know, he's a great person to train with and you know,

an even better person to share the podium with.

You mentioned the support staff there.

I presume you mean the support staff at Bath Performance Centre.

So I saw a post they did about you and how integral you've been to kind of the whole

system at Bath.

I think I know you were part of the university squad set up before stepping up to the Performance

Centre.

Just wondered if you had a thought or a word on kind of the team that you've worked with there

and how important they've been to kind of your rise into kind of a performing at these

major international meets.

And just finally, what to the next few months look like for you and the team at Bath

in terms of prepping for those couple of major meets coming up in the summer is the plan to

keep the game where it is or are you hoping to take it to another level come July and August too.

Yeah, that's the support staff at Bath.

They're absolutely fantastic.

I think it really helps having a smaller group of athletes.

It just means that there's a bit more room for kind of more personal relationships.

It allows more kind of one-on-one time, which is brilliant and it really shows us as a centre.

It's more kind of an extended family rather than a professional environment.

Obviously it is professional, but to an extent that we're so close that it's almost like an

extended family.

And then in regards to summer meets, obviously all the boys are going to be having either

commies or Europeans, which is awesome.

The fact that we've all got key meets to look forward to is brilliant.

We're all on the same page.

We're all working to one common goal at the end.

So a couple of months now, go back to the drawing board for sure, especially for me,

work out kind of what went wrong.

Look back at some races and just yeah, back to the drawing board and just really kind of delve into

what needs to be a little bit better and fix it for the summer and hopefully we'll be dropping some fast

time fingers crossed.

I'm now going to hand over to our good friend and contributor to the show Charlie Harris

from Scottish Swimming. As he's very kindly sent me some audio that he managed to grab both

with Anne Harrand Evans and also Kira Sloshen.

Now when I start stuff for week 30 solid, I just want me to back up with a hundred.

But even though that has to feel, I feel like I had a bit of self pressure on myself because

I think that being such a fast C-100, we could run into that something good in the one

Hunter, but I knew I had a wonderful awesome enemy. I moved us about again, like getting my head

wasted like the right place for that race. But you know, I also have strong events in the

Hunter on C-100, but I'm not just one tick pony, it's always exciting. So yeah, I'd be really

excited on the one thing, I'm excited to start one that would be a good race.

Yeah, I was going to see, obviously, and you know, you knew coming into this

speaker, you knew it's qualified for the team already. Is that sort of the idea to maybe

get the pressure up a lot of it and try and play with it maybe it wouldn't have played much

lighter than it would have been? Yeah, I think it did definitely do, but I always put pressure

back on myself, you know, like if I didn't procrastinate on myself to swim past,

I could have just created one myself as well, but that's not good for anyone.

And I wanted to get as much out as me as possible, so I challenged myself this morning

because I'm coming well and at your opinions, I can't just prove to make it to the final,

you have to put on the final, I'll try it yourself, but you've already had to get ready to

swim past again in the evening, and also we've played around with the tape for a little bit,

and I think if I wasn't pre-selected, I wouldn't have that race to like play around with that tape

as much, so, you know, it's such a bother to be like, did I just go on with that one?

Thank you so much.

So well done, Kira, Scotch record, under the nomination time, that's too far in the week for you,

talk us through that swimming, how are you feeling? I'm really happy that I kind of had my eyes on

the Scotch's record, because I think I did it here last year, so I kind of wanted to get it back,

and no, I'm just really happy that I have my start, something that I really need to work on,

and I changed my game plan tonight, and it was just get up and go, because I know my swim speed

is my strength, so clearly work to me, and I'll have a look at the data, I think it worked.

Must have worked, going by the time, I think this morning you were four tenths or so slower,

so, you know, how did you kind of turn that around and take so much time off of it?

Well, like I really just like listen to my coach Matt, and my physiologist and like look at the data,

and I've done my slowest start, I'd like ever done really this morning, so it was quite clear

that that was where I could, but again, a lot of confidence from looking at that data,

because it showed me that even though the time wasn't where I wanted it to be this morning,

my swim speed was the fastest it's ever been, so I took that away, and I turned it around,

and you had to go swimming with me. Awesome, and as I say, you've already had two

considerations times now, Scotch's record tonight, how much are you just going to join your swimming

at the minute, and being here, and you know achieving your goals? Yeah, no, I'm loving it,

I'm loving the feel that we've got to feel like Scotland, like here, we've got a focus that

look on what games are in summer, and really getting that vibe on full side, that everyone's like

looking ahead to summer, and I'm just like delighted that I can be part of it, and especially

I've said it the other day, the Kilt being announced this week, I just can't wait to hit my hands on

that hopefully. Thank you. Can we believe at Freestyle as I have just bumped into the one and only

Mr. Luke Guy, one of my favourite contributors, I don't think I should say that, maybe I should

keep that secret, but Luke, it's wonderful to see you, somehow we bumped into each other into

our hotel lobby. Firstly, how are you? I'm speaking to you on the morning of Thursday,

lots has gone on beforehand. Hi everybody, it's Luke G here, back again. I'm very good mate,

thank you very much. Been here since Tuesday, flying in and out, it's absolutely draining,

it's killing me, but you know, big racing, fat racing, big names, but no it's actually

pleasure to be here and catch up again. Yeah, I love it, we're sat in a very nice

section at the minute just to set the scene, we've got a little nice bit of light music in the

background, we've actually got a log fire burning, which I'm not sure if we need it considering the

conditions in this April spring, but yeah as I say we're on Thursday now, but maybe one thing

I wanted to reflect on with you is night one actually, where I was also there, we bumped into

each other, didn't quite have the audio equipment to hand, but the 400 freestyle, give us your take

on that, it was a race, this is the men's 400 freestyle, well there are a number of contenders,

but your brother James came away with it with a sublime swim in the end. He did indeed, thank you

for mentioning that. Yeah, I'm looking at the foreigner free, what an event, you know, I think it's

it would have been talked about quite a lot this year with, you know, big names from, from big

national centres up in Sterling, you know, the build up in Edinburgh or the coming to trials, you know,

well that's not be shy, but people like Jack Macmillan's had an incredible in season year,

and a lot of people think thought that he was going to run away with it, however, you know,

that wasn't the case, you can never write Jimmy Guy off in the aspect of his PB 3437, which got

himself at the World Champs in Kazan 11 years ago, but, you know, saying that someone like him is

going to get beat very, very easily is quite silly, I think, but look, the final is unbelievable,

the race itself, you know, James was in lane 7, the heat was okay, but we knew what we had to do

to win that race, you know, it wasn't about how fit you are, how strong you are, there was a

way to swim it, and a way to win it, and I think he executed it perfectly, and it bodes well for

the rest of the week, I'm honest, but look, hats off to people, Tyler Melbourne Smith, you know,

another PB, Jack PB'd as well, it was a fast field, and I think that event's moving on very,

very fast, but Jimmy Guy on top, cheers boys. Jimmy Guy's fast, just one thing to just discuss

there, as you mentioned, lane 7, so obviously the fastest seats will end up having the central

loans in the pool, but by James being drawn in lane 7, he was actually away from his rivals,

so someone like Jack, for example, and actually would you say that that possibly helped him,

given the circumstances? I think if you watch the heat back, everybody sat on James the whole way,

they paced themselves of what he was doing, and you can see it in the heat the whole way,

so we knew in the final, we'd take it out off the gun, you know, we'd go out long, strong,

controlled, and we'd build into it at 200, we'd get going, I think leaving it till 350 is a way too

dangerous, especially with the young lads, because you know, they've got less lads, you know,

the young, they're ready to go, the hungry, you've got to break them from the off, and that was

always the plan. That's what we did. That was a great race, lots of other good racing there,

I'm sure we'll chat to some of the mothers, obviously in the 100 press on night one,

also we were just discussing the 200 fly there, the men's event, I'm just trying to think,

well women, what we've had as well, evo, car, swam, really nice in, was that 100? 100 free,

yeah, and 100 back, but we had 53 yet? No, no, so, but we've got the women's 200 free

styles come tonight, that was yeah, big one tonight with Ferret Colbert, British record holder,

it'll be a very, very strong race, you know, you've got Leo Sloshlin from Manchester, you've got,

you know, Ferret Anderson Sterling, some big names for a big final, yeah, we look forward to that,

but for now, it's the guy who'll leave you to your chips. Thank you very much, enjoy.

You would never guess who I've now just bumped into, just randomly around Stratford,

I've happened to bump into the one and only Mr Withers,

look before we get into any of the professional swimming, we need to get into the main event

of the week that actually happened on Tuesday, which was the influence of relay that the weekly

free style was involved in, we won, technically we won, well technically we didn't win,

technically we got to qualify, we were announced as winners, we were announced as winners,

we actually went medley, do you want to just talk us through our team, but also more specifically,

you started with the backstroke, you got us going, yeah, take us through it. Yeah, it was a bit of

a surprise to get the call up and it was really excited about it really, to be honest,

first time swimming at London Aquatic Centre, a little bit shocked to be doing medley and then

being put on backstroke, which I think last time I swam backstroke long course, I think I've

probably about 14, so that was a little bit of a shock to the system, but it was really good fun,

and it was quite funny, the woman I was up against from the influence of team, when we were coming

around at the end, she had a go at me saying, when she dived in, I was underwater just wiggling away

from her apparently, so I thought that was quite funny, but yeah, it was me on the backstroke,

which is my number three stroke, you had Oscar on the breaststroke in his number four stroke,

you had you on the fly, something you've never done before in a race, and then you had Charlie

who's training for a marathon, so it's not like we were just, you know, a bunch of swimmers

competing against people that asked for it, so there's a little bit more to it than that,

we tried to make it as fair as we could, and I think we did a good job of that,

it was a great experience all round. Yeah, first year for that, hopefully we'll be back,

we've booked our lane for whenever that happens next, so we look forward to it,

move you away from the influence of relay as a rocky bar just smashes through one of the

advertising hoardings in our back, in the background, I apologise for the sound quality on that,

we're obviously Thursday at the minute, been some great racing so far,

could I get some of your highlights maybe, and then if there was one race that you wanted to go

into a little bit more? I know it's already been touched on by someone else, but the 400 freestyle

men's brilliant race, I think it's nice to see Britain have a bit of depth in that event again,

and I've predicted Jack to win just because of things I'd heard, but I should have known that

gym is inevitable, especially when he's training like that, he seems to be loving life in Manchester

back close to home, and it really shows, third fastest he's ever gone, and the two times he's gone

faster was when he became World Champion, and I think he came fourth at the Olympics,

so, and that was back in 2016, so the whole decade ago, so that's looking great,

and then the other race that really stood out to me was the women's 400 I am,

told a little bit more about the next generation with that one,

how many Smith, that was one I mentioned to watch out for at this competition,

and I think she won by like 12 seconds, and her breaststroke split was 116, she's only 16,

going on 17 years old, I think that's one we really should be getting excited about,

and one last one, it's nice to see the breaststroke boys going well in the 50 and the 100,

PT seems to be working his way back up to the top again, and if he goes those sort of times

that earned a season meet, they'll be right in contention for medals if not top of the podium, so

I think breaststroke swimming is looking like it's coming back round, so maybe it's slightly

stronger position than it was this time 12 months ago, but time will tell.

It will indeed, Mr Withers, thank you very much for that,

ahead of this evening, where we've got a number of key races, one of the key, the biggest event,

and it's the last event of the evening, it's actually the 100 metre men's free style,

let me get it out there, I think I'm going to get maybe your predictions as well as one of my

other favourite contributors, so stay with me for that, I'll let you finish off your lunch,

and we'll come back to you soon. Thank you.

Right then, I've found my friends, maybe both spoken already on the episode, this is something I've

wanted to do, I think this is a podcast first where we've got both, both looks on the podcast

together going head to head in some sort of swimming based, I'm not going to say trivia because

it's predictions today, we're going to predict the men's 100 free, what I'd like from you both

gentlemen, I'll give you a couple of minutes to think, is the order of the podium tonight.

Now the runners and riders include James Guy, Matt Richards,

Jason Mills, Jack McMillan, Gabriel Shefford, and that's probably

for those who can't see this, they were my two good friends,

they're mouthing my name for me, so I think that's fair to say they're probably the runners

and riders, have I missed anyone? Yes you have, there's a lad from America, what's his name?

Painter, sorry mate, you're in there for a shout 100%

Painter's in there, well, and Northern, I said Mills, we've got Whittle and Mills,

yeah don't forget, Mr Whittle himself, now who's I got to first, and I want you to talk to me

through your thoughts on it, whether we're going to have you starting again, can I have a top three

in order please, and I'd also like a winning time from both of you, to the point,

we'll go, we'll come back for the winning time, okay, so top three, I think first,

Matt Richards, no no you need to go third first, that's the big one, yeah let's do that again,

so from third place bronze, okay third place, I'm going to be bold and say Gabriel Shefford,

wow, second place, Jacob Mills, and I think his pedigree will come through as usual,

Matt Richards in first, so an interesting selection, Luke let me come across to you now,

while I'm doing that Mr Whitters you need to be thinking about your winning time, Mr Guy,

just to clarify, that was with us, not Luke Guy, this is Luke Guy, this is Luke Guy,

before the heat, this is still Luke Guy, so so preheats, I'd have said, you know anybody for

third, after watching the heat, I'm going to go Jimmy Guy third, with a nice little PB this morning,

second Mills, and I think Matt, it's Masterluse all day long, controlled, smart, ethical, swims

it very well, skills are unreal, can't see anybody being Richards, looking forward to that ethical

swim, now so you both have gone further, the same winner and second, obviously it's like

difference there in third, now this is really, is going to separate you guys, really show me who

the expert is, I'd like a winning time, Mr Guy I'm going to come to you first, I need second and

obviously the points, because it's going to be a tight race, 4739, okay, 4739, with us it's just said

that's fast, with us, 4749, okay that still sounds quite fast to me, thank you Gents, only time will tell

you will never guess who I'd bumped into here, behind the scenes of the whole product, the whole

machine here at Quattix GB, I've bumped into Charlie Harris, who is in my eyes the main man of

Scottish swimming, firstly Charlie, how are you and secondly, how is the week looking for for

anyone with a Scottish persuasion? Yeah cheers, always good to see Alex, yeah feeling a bit tired

now, day six of competition, two weeks on the road for us we're up and having been last week

for our age group champs, so yeah definitely feeling a bit tired now, but yeah it's been good,

it's been good, a lot of good swims across the board from from Scottish swimmers, lots of people

hitting consideration times, every single day from day one to, yeah, through day five now on

the last day of competition, so it's been pretty good, I think it'll be a really strong team,

come this summer for the Commonwealth Games, obviously still the selection to be made, but

we know people that fit times and things like that men, selectors, so we'll have decisions to

make around certain things, but looking good and looking like it'll be a strong team for a home

games and the summer in Glasgow. Yeah it has to be, I see here you've got your magic spreadsheet,

is this where all sort of the magic happens, is this how you know when you're stood on

Paul's side, all right, this swimmer's gone this time, which means they're under consideration time,

which means I needed a social media post to celebrate their achievements, is this kind of where it all

works from? Yeah that's right, I mean I should have probably done a bit of a job of updating it,

my plan was to actually like Colour Code 2's, who's made times and really tend to stuff like that,

I haven't done that, but yeah it's got all basically the times, everyone's in the nomination time

for events, European time, PBs, Scotch record, British record, and a few other bits and bobs as well,

so yeah that's how I know, and normally we've got a rough idea of people that are maybe

their PBs around, the nomination time so you keep maybe a closer eye, but you know things can

happen where people hit massive PBs, yes to do, for example Josh Mitchell from University of

Edinburgh, drop three seconds in the heat, you've got a counter for that, so well you know about him,

but he's one for example that's had an amazing swim this week, and really done the best they can do

to try and get the team for example, so you keep it eye out for people that are maybe slightly

further away, but I've still got a chance to do that, but yeah this kind of keeps a track of

everything that's going on, which is you need to do that because otherwise things would run away

and you wouldn't be able to you know keep up with what's going on, so yeah there are so many

races, so many athletes, you have to send that across to me at some point, trying to think which number

champs this is for you, how many of these have you done now? Number four, yeah so the first one was

22, 83 and Sheffield, and then three back to back in London so, and I was just yeah my point

with that question is how does this one feel to your previous three obviously you started out

at Sheffield now at London Aquatic Centre, how does the kind of the swimming product feel to you

and how's it maybe developed in those four years? Yeah yeah I think it's hugely different to that

first one in Sheffield, just the product in terms of like just the production values

is increased massively, so big shout out to obviously team Aquatic GB for that, it really is an

amazing truly put on, and yeah just in terms of the feel I think it's been a really really good

meet, people swimming quick, crates being good, it's built up over the weekend stuff as well,

so nice being really really good, no I tend to agree with you, my final question before I let you go

we have to ask it unfortunately, now we're going back to Tuesday night obviously things were

looking good for us in the weekly free styles relay, we had a really nice healthy lead, I was actually

swimming into the pool and then it came across to you, do you want to just talk, sort of listen

through what may be what happened from your side of things? I don't know what you're talking about

me, I'm sorry I nearly knocked you out, I heard on coming in the free style, so I think

subsequently we have seen the reaction team of Manus, nearly half a second there, I think there

were audible gasps in the arena, but do you know what I just got a bit excited, got a bit excited

and in my defence, never done a medley really before, so your stroke was a bit long coming in the wall,

put me off a little bit, one accusation, that's it so, but I thought the swim was all right and

give it, you know, splash, splash in, you're on the first and then, shush in the camera as well,

only to be de-cute, so that's a bit of a bummer for me, but yeah it was a good experience wasn't

it was really good, I actually, I think I've said this to you, but I went watching the footage

back, the shush for me was pretty special, I love that, so I watched that every day before I go to

bed now, but no Charlie, we love having you on the team, chat another relay today, so maybe

it's your moment for redemption, but yeah thanks so much for speaking to us, if you've got plans

to maybe not get de-cute today's relay? Yeah, yeah, safety is key on this one I think, I think

one second reaction team I think is the plan, sort of, yeah that's it, yeah definitely, the flippers on that set, so

heels in the blocks Charlie, love you to speak to you and enjoy the rest of your week, thank you

thank you very much for listening to today's episode, a day in the life of Champs, it was more like

a couple of days in the life at Champs, I hope you enjoyed that, we're really looking forward to

delving into some of the performances in the the coming podcast episodes and just a little shout

out for our producer Mr Bacon Alex, unfortunately he wasn't able to swim this week as he got

and quite a nasty viral infection, so we were hoping to catch him, certainly later on in the

week, he's been out of action, but yeah thankfully he's he's back to full speed now, so yeah real shame

he couldn't compete, but yeah a little shout out to him because I know he's been training for

Champs for a while, but I'm sure he'll be back to it, but yeah thank you so much for listening

this week guys and really looking forward to getting into some more deeper conversations about

the swims during the week, with our trusty contributors, thanks for listening guys and catch you next week.