William Graham

Sports Award

Age:

23

Biography

My name is Will Graham, I am 18 years old from Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire. At the moment, I swim competitively at regional and national level galas including swimming as part of the Leicestershire and East Midlands Team. Even since I was young I have always swum at county level but from around 2014 and onward I have been working very hard to get my swimming career as high as I possibly can.

Since my first national qualification in 2015, I achieved gold at the English Summer Nationals 2015 in 50 butterfly. The following year, I won 3 golds and 3 silvers in the 2016 regional championships, 2 medals at the English Summer Nationals 2016 as well as finishing 8^th in the final of the 100 Butterfly at the British Nationals whilst qualifying for 4 other events at the meet. In 2017 I qualified in multiple events in both the British Nationals and the English Nationals even though I went through surgery at the start of the competition season and had my all-important GCSE exams during this qualification period. This meant that I had to miss many training sessions which made it a lot harder to qualify. 2018 was one of my best years overall and I won another National gold medal in the 50 butterfly and was ranked top 10 in Britain for my age.

This is a big year for me as I have my A-levels just around the corner and I am finding it hard to balance them with swimming as well. I have already competed in the Edinburgh international meet and am looking forward to competing at the British Champs in Glasgow. Qualifying for summer nationals will be difficult as I am now in the open age group and my A levels will take up a lot of my time before that point. This year I am travelling a lot further for galas so this funding will help massively in facilitating the cost of travel and accommodation throughout the year. Thank you very much for the support Inspire!

Simon Taylor - Inspire Lead said: "Swimming is a gruelling sport and Williams ability to dedicate time to both his swimming and studies is a commitment that is an inspiration to other young people."