Leeds aquatics team success brings home international medals

22 Jul 2025

Leeds aquatics team success brings home international medals

Leisure and sport

Leeds City Council's aquatic training scheme has brought home six medals from the European Junior Championships that took place earlier this month.

Five swimmers got selected from Leeds for the championship this year, more than from any other programme and the highest number Leeds has had selected since 2008.

The team brought home three gold, one silver and two bronze medals.

As a result of their great performances Daniel Ransom and Gabriel Shepherd have also been selected for the World Aquatics Junior Championships in August, where they will represent Great Britain amongst some of the strongest junior swimmers from across the world.

The aquatics scheme at John Charles Centre for Sport has cemented itself as the leading aquatics programme in Great Britain, providing more athletes to Great Britain's world class programmes and the England national performance and talent programmes than any other aquatics programme.

Councillor Salma Arif, executive member for adult social care, active lifestyles, and culture, said: "I want to say congratulations to the whole team who competed in the European Junior Championships, what an achievement.

"We are very proud of our aquatics training scheme and it's wonderful to see that the hard work of the coaches and the athletes continues to pay off year after year."

Jamie Fowler, group coach at Leeds City Council's swim training scheme, said: "I would like to thank Active Leeds, Leeds City Council and the City of Leeds Swimming Club for the support that is provided for competitive swimming in the city.

"To have five swimmers at European Junior level is a fantastic achievement and is more than any other programme in Britian. It's a true testament to how strong our age group and youth development programme is."

List of medals:

Gabriel Shepherd

• Bronze Men's 4x100 Freestyle Relay
• Silver Mixed 4x100 Freestyle Relay
• Gold Men's 4x100 Medley Relay

Hollie Wilson

• Bronze Women's 4x200 Freestyle Relay

Daniel Ransom

• Gold Mixed 4x100 Medley Relay
• Gold Men's 4x100 Medley Relay

ENDS