Epic Failure

Agree with this, a very fair review. I sound like a broken record as I've been banging on about it elsewhere on the internet, but we're the nation with the most to think about in terms of 2026 in athletics, with 2 home championships. As you rightfully say, this year is absolutely the least important in the cycle for British athletes. Our number of top 8 finishes was pretty much where it normally is, they just weren't necessarily translated into medals as much as we might have hoped. There's a wider point about the (non)competitiveness in things like field events but in terms of comparisons to recent years, we're not far away. Beijing looks to be important, not least because you have to imagine that it will come in the window for LA qualifying. Better to achieve a mark there, if possible, than have to chase around the world in early 2028.

The most recent guys we've had at Euros have been Duckworth and Bryant, both obviously retired now. As Rafa says, Turner and Ball are the current 'most likely in the future' but as ever in the Dec, fitness is the struggle. Church is a bit older but obviously that doesn't rule out continuing to improve, but I guess his potential ceiling is the lowest of the 3. With both CGs and Euros next summer, it's very likely we'll see all 3 in a national vest of some sort, fitness allowing.

They do have choices. Muir and a few others have chosen the more traditional white. Gutting for Molly. She was definitely one of our better individual medal hopes.

The only 2 athletes on relay funding that didn't run in the relay are Vicki O and Reardon. Anning, MHS and Dobson are on individual funding. YMJ is on potential relay funding but ran in the heat obv. Also, the UK funding is done on an annual level and there are weird rules as to how many athletes can be on which level, and whether you can change levels. So I wouldn't read as much into the specifics on that for any more than a guide. It's as much about making yourself available for things like World Relays. Finally, the UK sport funding is done on the Olympic cycle. So, arguably, the decision about what happens in a WC matters far less to that. They may still take into account WC performance, but there will be another WC before LA and it is entirely possible that we medal in the mixed relay there. I'm sure that the athletes and coaches have had many a discussion. And maybe they made a collective decision to focus on the individual here. It would hardly be an absurd choice. On the subject of hurdlers - Newnham aside - none of the others have done anything to suggest that they would have been better options than those who ran. So really it comes down to whether you think that Reardon and Ohurougu should have been in there. And, for me, Vicki has never shown herself to be a comfortable relay runner, especially as she would have been in traffic due to the set nature of the mixed relay. She usually leads off if she does the relay at all. And I'm not going to begrudge Reardon being given the chance of seeing what his first major individual champs looks like. If the focus is *just* maximising medals, sure, it probably was a poor choice. If at least part of it is helping to maximise the future potential of athletes, I have no problem with the decisions made.

Well, after those mental heats, they all made the 'right' decision still to skip the relay imo. Especially on the men's side. Crazy fast heats today.

Looking at the GB team from this champs, I think we're already doing that.

They are okay at rugby. But for a country of only 4m, having two world cups - and been competitive in others over the years - is pretty impressive. Not everyone can be New Zealand and be competitive across a range of things lol.

I mean, if we want to blame anyone, blame our individual runners who selfishly put their own event ahead of the relay. Not to mention World Athletics for putting the heats of the individual the day after the relay, which is just dumb scheduling. We don't have USA depth to be able to have relay only runners without it making a difference. And it's tough, in my opinion, to expect the individual event athletes to prioritise the mixed relay over their own event. With only one switch being allowed it was always going to make for some tough choices. Fair play to YMJ therefore, for being willing to do the job in the heat.

In which? Men's or women's? I'd disagree, in both. On the women's sides, *all* the teams are much improved skills wise from even 10 years ago. There are still disparities between the top nations and the rest but they are less than they have been previously. On the men's side, the last world cup saw Portgual beat Fiji, who themselves were unfortunate to lose to England in the QF, who then almost beat the champions South Africa in the SF. The professional era has allowed the likes of Georgians to play at the highest club level. Are there still inequalities between federations? Absolutely. Will we ever get a truly level playing field? No, like any sport. But the idea that we're getting less competitive rather than more is not borne out by any of the evidence imo.

It depends on the type of viewer. A casual viewer won't necessarily enjoy it. A dedicated rugby fan can still find enjoyment in it. The scoreline often doesn't reflect some of the battles within the game - England's win over Australia, for example, was a lot tougher than the scoreline ended up showing. Getting the exposure from tournaments like this - as well as financial support - is vital to growing the competitiveness of the game. We've seen in the men's game various countries get more competitive over time. No reason the same cannot happen in the women's game. It might still take a while, but it will happen. Look at women's football - way more competitive than it was even 10-15 years ago.

Given that it is pretty much an open secret that India wants to host an Olympics before long, it would make sense to have a 'warm up' hosting the CGs.

Short answer, they don't. They have 4 listed in the 800m and 5 listed in the 1500m. That's because in the 1500m they have the reigning WC in Josh Kerr, so we *do* get 4 entries into the final event. We've named a reserve in each event in case of late injury (Davies in the 800m, Fogg in the 1500m). Same is true in the men's 100m (Hinchliffe), women's 200m (Eduan) and women's 1500m (Snowden). It's fairly common for teams to do that if they have an athlete who would get in the field anyway if there were an injury to a compatriot. If you look at the US team, they have a named reserve in pretty much every event.

Well, that's the England team size! The amount of doubling will also depend on what the likes of Richards and Scott etc want to do as well. You would imagine the Scots in particular will be more keen on a decent showing in the CGs than others might! From memory Duncan skipped the Euros in 2022 after doing the CGs. 2022 also had worlds as well, didn't it? A bit like the athletics there were some trebles for swimmers that year.

The Euro team composition will likely be influenced by the CG teams, as in 22. Like in 22, the two champs are only a couple of weeks apart, with the CGs coming first again. The British Champs will also be the primary qualification event for multiple of the home nations to get swimmers to the CGs, so should be a competitive meet. I'm fairly certain that Wales and Scotland will preselect some of their stars for the CGs, but if those swimmers want a European slot as well, they will still have to turn up and perform at the British Champs. The times are generally slightly down on the times required for the WCs this year, as you would expect for a Euros. Obviously, the one big change is that we now have the 50m stroke events getting a Q method of their own to start preparing athletes ahead of LA28.

Well, with 2 days left to go, this is already GB's most successful World Jnrs since the event was started back in 2006. Headlined by Filip Nowacki's genuinely world class performances, obviously, but some very strong swims across the team. Mills, Fearn, Morgan, Taylor and Smith all continue to have an excellent summers. Blythe Kinsman looked off her best earlier in the week in the 100m back but has qualified 2nd fasted for the 50m final tomorrow, so hopefully the earlier problems were just the inevitable consistency problems of youth!

Pah, shows what I know. Filip's time at the Euro Jnrs is nothing. Now his time at the World Jnrs...that's something to get excited by (For those that don't follow swimming, he today won the Jnr 200m breaststroke WC in a time that would have won the SENIOR WC as well this year).

I've not been paying much attention to squash in the last couple of years; I hadn't realised that the El Shorbagy brothers had switched allegiance from Egypt to England. They are both fantastic players but will be very, very old (in squash terms) by LA, so it's possible that they won't get there. If they limited it to 1 athlete per NOC, Egypt would be more annoyed that British Cycling were when they changed that lol.

I'm not reading too much into the week (or even this year in general) because this was always going to be the quietest year of the current Olympic cycle - with Euros and Commies next year, then 27 WCs and finally LA, there's an obvious build up over those three years, which will each bring their own pressures. So this year, across many of the Olympic sports, is the one to...relax. Obviously they are all still professionals but it is fairly clear that some are not quite at their top. Some have been more open about it than others (Peaty obviously, Dean as well). Which then leads you to wonder whether that is more widespread than we think - to use Oli Morgan again - could he actually not be working at 100% this year and actually capable of even more than he has shown? We'll never know, but it isn't impossible to imagine. And in swimming especially, with the illness that we know hit the US and has seemingly hit others (I believe GBR shared a training camp with the US, so it wouldn't surprise me if they were caught up in it), these Worlds shouldn't be read too much into. But all that said, fly is still very obviously the weakest link, especially in the absence of a WC women's backstroker right now. It's not that our swimmers are underperforming, they just aren't yet quite showing they are capable of keeping the distance to the top nations down right now. We're still looking like we're giving up at least a second in both the men's and mixed relay on the fly and we don't have Adam operating at a level where we know that he's definitely going to be at least a second ahead on the breast like we used to. As you say, Ed and Keanna have both had solid weeks and there are green roots elsewhere - Dean Fearn had a good Euro Jnrs. Theodora Taylor is gifted in pretty much everything, so could develop her fly (although the free is probably her likely spot). And Blythe Kinsman is probably the best bet for the backstroke spot right now. Those latter 3 combined with Nowicki to dominate at the Euro Jnrs in the mixed medley.

Bilbao is older than the other two and hasn't really kicked on yet. Obviously he still could and I believe he is at Arizona State, which seems like a decent place to be. But right now he's not quite there. I have to disagree with you about Adam's arrival. He didn't come from nowhere in 2014, that was just when he had his international breakout. He came from nowhere in 2013. Which is why he holds the GBR records for all 3 breaststroke events for 18 year olds - https://www.swimmingresults.org/downloads/records/BR/BR_Progressive_LC_Male_18Years.pdf Literally no British 18 year old has ever swum faster than him. So what Max and Filip are doing at 17 *IS* impressive. Filip's 200m time from the Euro Jnrs is super impressive - it would have placed him 5th in Singapore this week. Bottom line is that Filip holds the British Jnr records at 100m and 200m, and they are both within a tenth of Adam 50m Jnr record, with another year of eligibility for each of them to improve further before they join the senior ranks. Now obviously that doesn't mean that they will get close to what Adam achieved or keep improving, but the signs are positive. Oli's poor week has still seen him get within 2/10th of his 100m Back British record. Given that there's rumours that the British team has potentially been hit by the same bug as the US team, I wouldn't worry too much about that. The fly issue is definitely the bigger one.

Only some of the weekend finals will be on NBC. Kinda disappointing that so much of it is now not only behind a paywall but on a streaming service that only the most dedicated fans will have. Way too many streaming services out there. From memory, last year was entirely on Peacock. Which is still a paywall but a more affordable one with much more content on it to make it worth getting.

As much as I love Adam and what he has done for British swimming, I think he's got a challenge on his hands, especially in the 100m. Both Max Morgan and Filip Nowacki are as fast/faster at 17 than Adam was at 18. Obviously it doesn't necessarily follow that they will continue that progression but a 33 year old Adam vs 2 hungry 20 year olds? Rather him than me!

Yeah, although looking at the team, I think they consciously went with age rather than even just selecting a B or C team. I couldn't be bothered checking for all the swimmers but the first 4 or 5 I saw from the GB Champs results were all born in 2010. Some of them are obviously talents but I think there's a chunk of older juniors who could have gone in theory and weren't good enough to go to the Euro Jnrs who have been skipped entirely! I guess it makes sense to give the next batch experience.

In swimming definitely more looking to 32. Most (potentially all, I've not checked) of the team are swimmers born in 2010. If they are ready for LA they'll be ahead of schedule. In fact, our "senior" juniors (if that makes sense) didn't attend this meet. They went to the Euro Jnrs in Slovakia at the beginning of the month, where they topped the table with 9 gold, 5 silver and 5 bronze. The pick of that team will be going to the World Jnrs, happening mid August in Romania, along with Max Morgan and Jacob Mills, who didn't go to the Euro Jnrs as they are with the senior team in Singapore this week.

I can't talk to the motivation, but the vast majority of countries are sending their top ranked athlete on SB in most events. And if not the top ranked, the second ranked (and I'm sure some of the absences can be explained by injury etc). I'm sure the athletes themselves are competitive by nature and will want to do the best that they can. Who can forget the Belgian shot putter who ran the hurdles in Poland a few years back, just to help her team. That's the natural competitive nature these folks have.

She apparently knocked out a 2:08 in the SFs of the 200 fly. I genuinely hope there's nothing nefarious here and that she's treated well by the coaching, for her sake as much as anything.