The British Olympic Association (BOA) today selected two synchronised swimmers for Team GB at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.

The athletes are:
 
Duet

Olivia Allison
Jenna Randall

Commenting on their selection:

Olivia Allison:

"I'm really happy to have been selected for the Olympics. It will be my first, and to be involved in such a prestigious event is an honour. This will be a great experience and will be a stepping stone as we look towards London 2012”.

Jenna Randall:

“It’s fantastic we are going to our first Olympics and will be a great experience for 2012.  I am honoured to be selected as part of Team GB and look forward to returning to Beijing in August and showing the world what we can do”.

Simon Clegg, Team GB 2008 Chef de Mission, said:
“I am particularly delighted to welcome Olivia and Jenna into Team GB for this summer’s Olympic Games.  This is the first time that Team GB has been represented in synchronised swimming since Barcelona 1992 and shows the impact of increased lottery funding in the context of 2012.  This shows the new strength and depth of emerging talent in Olympic sports across many disciplines and I wish them both well in their final preparations for Beijing”.

 
British Synchronised Swimming National Performance Director, Biz Price:

"The duet are doing some great work and everything is going well for them. I'm very, very pleased with how Olivia and Jenna performed at the qualification tournament in Beijing in which they gave three solid performances.

The scores Olivia and Jenna have been getting have been in the high 8's, and I will be looking at the programme and increasing the difficulty of the routines as we take the next step up ready for the Olympic Games."

Both Jenna and Olivia will be available for phone interviews between 3-4pm today.

Click on individual names for biographies.
 
Notes to Editors

Team GB is expected to consist of approximately 300 athletes and a further 200 officials.

Team GB could be competing in up to 22 sports.
 
The Beijing 2008 Olympic Games will take place from 8th to 24th August 2008.
 
The British Olympic Association (BOA) is the National Olympic Committee for Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Its role is to prepare our nation’s finest athletes for and lead them at the summer, winter and youth Olympic Games. The BOA delivers extensive elite level support services to Britain’s Olympic athletes and their National Governing Bodies throughout each Olympic cycle and in the UK is responsible for the development and protection of the Olympic Movement.


For more information please contact Becki Middleton in the BOA Communications Department on 020 8871 2677 ext 215.
 

All interview requests for the athletes should go through Steph West, British Swimming Media Assistant, T: 01509 632236/M: 07917 876459.

Olivia Allison and Jenna Randall have met the selection criteria needed to book Britain’s place at the Olympics after a superb performance at the qualification tournament for synchronised swimming.

The 2008 Olympic Games Synchronised Swimming Qualification Tournament at the National Aquatics Centre saw the world’s leading nations descend on Beijing to book their place at the Olympics.

The British pairing competed in the second round of the Duet Free event today for the final four places available at the Beijing Games.

The Olympic duet qualification rules were somewhat complicated due to the large number of teams involved.

The eight countries and regions that have qualified for the team event are automatically entered for the Olympic duet event. The remaining 16 pairs comprise of the top-ranked pair at the continental championships or continental games and the best-ranked pairs at this tournament, excluding those who have already earned Olympic berths.

The top 14 ranked duets after the Technical and the first round of the Free event at this qualification tournament were selected for the Olympics.

Only four places were left for the remaining duets, which were decided by taking the Technical score and that from the second round of the Free event.

Britain’s Allison and Randall were joined by duets from Slovakia, Austria, Belarus, Dominica, Venezuela, the Czech Republic and Germany.

They took to the water first in a fully packed National Aquatics Centre with high hopes after going into the second round as the top ranked duet.

After a solid performance, the girls maintained their position at the top of the scoreboard to become one of four duets to take up the final places for the event at the Olympics later this year.

With a final score of 87.666, Allison and Randall were a point clear of their nearest rivals, Katsiaryne Kulpo and Nastasiya Parfenova of Belarus.

British Synchronised Swimming National Performance Director, Biz Price, was happy with the performances they gave at the tournament.

“I’m very, very pleased with how Olivia and Jenna have done. They have given three solid performances and were leading throughout today’s round,” said Price.

“In terms of performance, we were ahead of the other competing nation’s and when you look at the scores from today it would have given us 14th position on Friday.

“The girls were disappointed to have had to swim in the second round but being able to swim in front of a full-capacity crowd in the centre would have been a good experience for them.”

With Britain’s place secured the athletes will begin preparing for the Olympics when they return home.

“Looking ahead, we have another training camp in Spain which will be a week long and some competitions in the lead up to the Games,” continued Price.

“The scores Olivia and Jenna have been getting have been in the high 8’s, and I will be looking at the programme and increasing the difficulty of the routines as we take the next step up.”

Allison was pleased with how the tournament went for her and Randall.

“We had a plan coming into the competition and knew what we wanted to achieve. We’ve proven that we are meant to be here and will work to improve on our performances here,” said Allison.

“The pool is amazing and it was really good to swim in front of a large crowd today. When we get back home we’ll look back on this week and revise to routine to make it even better.”

-ENDS-

For further details contact Steph West, British Swimming Media Assistant, on 01509 632 236, 07917 876 459 or email stephanie.west@swimming.org

British Swimming is the National Governing Body for Swimming, Diving, Synchronised Swimming, Water Polo and Open Water in Great Britain.  It is responsible internationally for the high performance representation of the sport. The members of British Swimming are the three Home Countries national governing bodies of England (Amateur Swimming Association), Scotland (Scottish Amateur Swimming Association) and Wales. (Welsh Amateur Swimming Association)  British Swimming seeks to enable its athletes to achieve gold medal success at the Olympics, Paralympics, World Championships and Commonwealth Games.

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