Ponds Forge is getting ready to reap the rewards at the Olympic and Paralympic Games with six athletes aiming for medal glory in Beijing.
Nick Robinson-Baker, Ben Swain and Hayley Sage, all 21, will be in the hunt for medals in the diving competitions, James Kirton, 23 and Siroos Saeed, 19 will be looking for podium places in the swimming and James Crisp, 25, will be competing at the P
aralympics and hoping to add to his already impressive medal haul.
The super six train at Ponds Forge - five will compete for Great Britain while Siroos will represent Iran at next month's 29th Olympiad.
Swim coach Russell Barber said: "When James Kirton first started training at Ponds Forge at the end of 2002 he hadn't even qualified for a national championship. Since then he has grown in talent a great deal and has worked his way up the rankings. He is now ready to go to his first Olympics.
"James always had the ambition to get there and this is a case of a dream come true. The goal was always to qualify, but now he is there, he wants to compete for a medal finish and hopefully he'll push for it all the way.
"Conversely, James Crisp will be taking part in his third Paralympics, after competing in Sydney in 2000 and Athens four years ago. He picked up three gold medals in Australia and collected another three medals in Greece, so he is keen to maintain that great record.
"He currently holds the world record in both the 200 and 400 metre freestyles and so should put on a good show in China.
"Siroos is a Wakefield lad and is Yorkshire through and through. But his father is Iranian and he has decided to represent Iran internationally. He's a great swimmer and is really looking forward to the Games."
Nick, Ben and Hayley will be travelling to the Olympics hoping to impress in the diving events.
Diving coach Adam Sotheran said: "Ben and Nick have been training at Ponds since 2003 and Hayley since 2004. They have grown from having ambitions of taking part in the Olympics, to actually going to the Games with a chance of coming back with a medal.
Ben will be taking part in the individual event and in the springboard synchronised event with Nick while Hayley teams up with Tandi Gerrard from Leeds in the springboard synchronised event.
The full article contains 414 words and appears in Sheffield Telegraph newspaper.
