By her own admission, swimmer Leah Crisp endured a ‘tough first year’ at the University of Bath in 2020/21. If relocating in the midst of a global pandemic wasn’t bad enough, an inauspicious start to university life was exacerbated when a freak accident - which saw her fall backwards when reaching for a pull-up bar - resulted in her breaking her elbow. ‘It took quite a while to get over my broken elbow and also for me to get into my groove swimming-wise, especially with the transition of moving to university,’ recalls Leah, who was born and raised in West Yorkshire.
Four years on, it’s fair to say things have very much improved for Leah. The 22-year-old recently completed her BSc in Economics and Mathematics and plans to stay on in Bath, where she is part of an elite training group of swimmers based at the British Swimming Performance Centre at the University. Back in February meanwhile, she finished 17th overall in the women’s 10km open water race at the 2024 World Aquatics Championships in Doha to earn Great Britain one of the 13 quota spots that were still available at the time for this summer’s Olympic Games.
‘Making it to the Games means so much,’ says Leah, who will head to Paris to make her Olympic debut just a week or so after her graduation ceremony at the University of Bath. ‘There's so many years of hard work and an amazing team around me that’s gone into this. After a tough year or so when I started in Bath, everything’s fallen into place this year and I’m so excited about the Olympics.’ Leah will compete alongside 21 other swimmers in the 10k open water swim in the Seine in the heart of Paris on August 8.
‘The beauty of open water swimming is that there's never really a clear favourite going into the race,’ responds Leah, when asked about her Olympic medal hopes. ‘Absolutely anything could happen during the two hours. So, I think I’m just going to go there and just give it my absolute all and see what I can do.’
When talking about the Olympics, Leah is quick to acknowledge the role both the University staff and its facilities have played in her qualification for Paris 2024. ‘I really wanted to come to Bath because I felt it had the right mix between the academic and sporting side of things,’ says Leah, who has been doing 10 swims of roughly two hours each week, totalling around 75-80km in readiness for the Olympics.
‘The University has an incredible training centre and amazing training group. It just seemed like the perfect place for me when choosing a university and so it has proven. ‘There's an amazing team of support staff around you. That was especially true during the time when I had my injury. You can just count on everyone to be there for you and provide you with the support you need. And it’s fantastic to be around an amazing group of athletes, across different sports – Olympic and Paralympic - all striving for the same thing. That makes for a great training atmosphere. At first, I was a bit nervous moving into a group of people that I looked up to during my swimming career. But once you settle in, everyone's just great friends and there’s such a great team atmosphere.’
