Katie Shanahan became the first Scottish woman to break the 60-second barrier in the 100m individual medley at the Scottish National Short-Course Championships in Edinburgh.
The 18-year-old has burst on to the international scene this year, winning two medals at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham before claiming a silver at the European Championships.
In breaking her own Scottish record at the Royal Commonwealth Pool with her time of 59.86 seconds, Shanahan exceeded all her expectations, particularly after missing day one of the meet through illness.
“I can’t actually believe I’ve just done that! Before the race my coach Brad [Hay] said that if I went under a minute he’d give me a tenner, so I’m £10 richer which is good! I just tried to execute the race plan as well as I could, and I’m happy I did that,” the teenager said.
“This event is not a target event as we only swim it in short course, but whenever I do it, I just try and go as fast as I possibly can. Now that I’m under that minute mark it will be nice to see if that can go further.”
Shanahan’s gold was her second of the meet after winning gold in the 200m individual medley in a personal best time and having missed the opportunity for national titles in her specialist events on the opening day, she was heartened by her form.
“I’ve been looking for a PB in that for quite a while now, I’ve been working on it a lot in training, so it was fantastic. Missing the 400 IM and 200 back was really disappointing, but these things happen and I suppose a bit of rest is good, and it paid off in the end.”
Having honed her trade at the City of Glasgow Swim Team, Shanahan has recently relocated to the lauded training centre at Stirling University and she believes improvements have already been made thanks to the new training environment.
“It’s been a really exciting time, changing programmes, and it’s really paying off,” she said. “I’ve swam quite well this weekend, and I’m now excited for the long course season, excited for trials, and just seeing how fast I can go.”
Second behind Shanahan in the 100m IM was Edinburgh University’s Katie Goodburn, who also broke the previous Scottish record, touching the wall in 1 minute 0.41 seconds.
Kara Hanlon completed a breaststroke clean sweep by adding the 100m title to the 50m and 200m crowns. The 25-year-old won in 1 minute 6.39 seconds, over a second-and-a-half ahead of her University of Edinburgh team-mate, Goodburn.
Olympic gold medallist Kathleen Dawson could not add the 50m backstroke gold to her 100m title, but she did become national champion, finishing second in 27.05 seconds, just eight hundredths of a second behind England’s Lauren Cox.
Evan Jones became national champion despite coming second in the 200m individual medley, finishing second behind Loughborough University’s James McFadzen, while Ollie Carter broke his third Scottish record of the meet, setting a mark of 4 minutes 12.65 seconds in the S10 400m freestyle.
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