Talbot Heath School Swimming Academy, one of the newest Swim England clubs, aims to be a leading beacon for female youth swimming development. The programme has quickly gained momentum by incorporating the expertise of Olympic Champion Anna Hopkin and insights from key staff at AP Race, which recently partnered with Swim England to inspire, promote, and develop the sport of swimming.
Anna has guided Talbot Heath Swimming Academy coaches, staff, and affiliated sports science practitioners through two coaching workshops and then shared her unique swimming journey with an inspirational talk to the swimming & sporting pupils. She stepped back from competitive swimming in her junior years and rediscovered her passion with her first local club, preparing a route to university. This led to her moving through the ranks and breaking onto the competitive scene in 2018 at the Commonwealth Games. Later, she made history at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics in the British mixed 4 x 100m Relay team that stormed to Gold, breaking the World Record in the process.
During her talks, Anna discussed the positive and negative lessons of her experiences and the reasons why she initially completely left the sport. She discussed the importance of relationships and the communication needed for female athletes to thrive and provided insights into her non-linear path to achieving her goals, which gave a reassuring perspective for pupils and staff alike.
Head of Swimming, Barry Alldrick, praised Anna’s openness about the challenges female athletes face, noting, “Anna discussed the hard and confusing developmental areas that females go through, offering us lots of reflections that will help shape our programme and striving to work in partnership with each athlete on their meaningful journey.”
Anna’s discussion on coaching language and styles was particularly useful for staff to hear. She shed light on how these factors impacted her training and how this can affect athletes at all levels of their journey.
The key messages for pupils to hear really emphasised that “Outcome is the destination; the process is the journey.” The more focused you are on the processes, the more joy you gain from achieving outcomes.
Further messages were around how important it is for each individual to work with team mates and coaches in developing the culture that will challenge and support everybody, with a final message of reminding pupils that in a world where it is easy to compare yourself to everyone, enjoy the small wins you can have every day, embodying the AP Race motto of “Better than Yesterday”.
As Talbot Heath Swimming Academy strides forward, Anna Hopkin’s time with the team has not only inspired the team but also shaped the programme. The school is very grateful for the support from AP Race and is committed to working on case studies and providing the wider swimming community with education on developing female athletes.
