A record number of Black Lion swimmers have been invited to attend the British and English Nationals this year.

Eleven of the club’s swimmers have met the qualification criteria, gained during the last week of the Kent Championships at the London Aquatics Centre in March and at the South East Regional Championships which were held in Wycombe, Winchester and Crawley.

Black Lion’s previous highest number was five, across both the British and English Nationals.

Mia Colyer, 18, also took part in the Aquatics GB British Championships in April at the London Aquatics Centre, competing against those swimmers chasing their times to qualify for this year’s Paris Olympics.

Colyer is Black Lion Swimming Club’s most successful female swimmer and most of her times for this summer’s competition were achieved at this meet.

Colyer and Noah Dodd, 14, will be attending the British Nationals at Ponds Forge, Sheffield, in July. Colyer will be swimming the 50m, 100m, 200m backstroke and 200m individual medley, while Dodd will be swimming the 200m breaststroke.

Both will also compete at English Nationals at the end of July, along with Abbie Outram (18), Alex Youseman (16), Amy Conner (17), Calyssa Bradshaw (14), George Goodwin (15), Isabella Arundell (15), Kahlen Arundell (17), Leah Watson (16) and Oscar Colyer (16).

The British Summer Championships and Swim England Summer Nationals are two of the country’s biggest domestic swimming events of the year.

The meet forms part of a swimming competition structure whereby the top-ranked swimmers are invited to compete at the British Swimming Summer Championships.

The next ranked swimmers at Swim England-affiliated clubs - or those who have chosen to be ranked as an English swimmer - are invited to compete at the Nationals. The rankings are based on swimmers’ performances at level 1 meets and this year’s qualification window ran from March 8 to May 12.

Black Lion chairperson Philip Clarke said: “We are immensely proud of our swimmers who have qualified for this year’s British and Summer Nationals.

“They have achieved their qualification times through sheer hard work and determination to be the best they can be.

“These swimmers train seven days a week whilst also juggling school, working as swimming teachers and some are taking their GCSEs and A Level exams.

“In the process of gaining these times many long-standing club records have also been broken.

“We are a club that celebrates the successes of all of our swimmers who regularly travel the south east and further afield to compete in competitions to enable them to achieve the times and improve their rankings for county, regional and national competitions.

“Of course, none of this would be possible without our head coach, Jerome Moerman, and the team of coaches who support him, the volunteers who run the club and, most importantly, the parents for playing ‘taxi’ to their swimmer from training sessions to competitions and spending hours watching, cheering and supporting.

“Since Covid, the club has gone from strength to strength with a growth not only in membership, but in our successes, too.”