‘The pain is the prize’: Swimmer dubbed the ‘Ice Mermaid’ takes on challenge to swim the Seven Seas
Ashes to ashes: The swimmer has been dubbed the ‘Ice Mermaid’ by rivals after spending months training for her first race
It is the dream of anyone who competes in swimming to become the ‘Ice’ – a person who can freeze even the toughest, most unpredictable, conditions.
So it was a matter of just that over the past three months for the Swimmers’ Gym in London.
The swimmer was being trained by six British athletes, who are making up Swimmers’ Gym in celebration of their new life together after they split up.
They were all born in the small Welsh fishing town of Aberystwyth, and were brought up by a single mother who became a swimming coach. So the seven Swimmers were taught to race at a very early age, and have been training together ever since.
The group of swimmers includes four women who swim faster than 200m – one of them has set a world record in the 100m final at the London 2012 Olympics – and one man who was just 19 years old at the time (who was born in Swindon).
Abercrombie is seen as a ‘Swimmer-of-the-Year’ by UK Sports and has competed at the Olympics, World Championships and European Championships.
But it has been the training he received from the six athletes that has seen him go from the Welsh town of his birth to a world champion, a record breaker who has beaten the men’s 200m Olympic final record for a second time in his career.
So he is now set to take on the World Championship in Manchester this summer in a bid to break that record, and he is hoping to set a personal best. Ashes to ashes: The swimmers were brought up by a single mother who became a swimming coach
Tough times: The group of swimmers was brought up in a small Welsh fishing town by a single mother who became a swimming coach who was responsible for encouraging them to race and train hard
But he has a problem: they have been competing together for three months now and