By Tom Degun

May 3 - Australia’s top male 200 metres freestyle and individual medley swimmers will today embark on a six-day stroke camp at Bond University on the Gold Coast in order to hone their technical racing skills ahead of the London 2012 Olympics.



The camp, which is the first of a series of camps leading up to London 2012, is an important component of Swimming Australia’s technical blueprint which aims to maximise all bio-mechanical aspects of the swimmers stroke.

The camp will mark the first time that there has been a 200m freestyle and medley camp held together in Australia.

The decision to combine to the two was made after Swimming Australia’s qualitative research highlighted the similarities of the disciplines.

Head coach of the camp Vince Raleigh, who coaches at the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) in Canberra, understands the value of merging such camps. 

Raleigh said: "We discovered that 200m freestyle and IM (individual medley) swimmers use the same training and energy systems so it was a natural marriage to bring them together into one camp.

"If you look at the United States, their victorious 4x200m freestyle relay team [at the Beijing 2008 Olympics] also has some amazing medley swimmers."

The camp has a strong focus on youth with 10 of the 16 swimmers under the age of 20 and only four members having competed at an Olympic Games.

One of the youngest members of the camp Kenneth To, 18, has been provisionally selected to represent Australia at the first ever Summer Youth Olympic Games in Singapore this August.

The technical based camps, overseen by national head coach Leigh Nugent, are aimed at ensuring all Olympic hopefuls receive the highest quality coaching available in the country.

Additional stroke and distance camps, such as the women’s 400m freestyle and men’s breaststroke camps which are scheduled for late July, will be rolled out in the lead up to London 2012. 

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