Kindred at home in Brazil

Eurosport - Tue, 24 Nov 12:44:00 2009

Sascha Kindred insists he will feel more at home than most at the inaugural World Short Course Swimming Championships in Brazil after his past success in the discipline.

sascha kindred swimmer (PA) - 0

The 31-year-old is in fine form heading to Rio de Janeiro - home of the 2016 Paralympics - after scooping triple gold and silver at the European Long Course Championships in Iceland last month.

Kindred took his international medal tally since making his British bow at the World Championships in Malta in 1994 to 44 in Reykjavik - a feat that stands him above most of his domestic rivals.

The British team will step into the relative unknown in South America with short course swimming being put on the world stage for the first time but Kindred is adamant he knows what he is doing.

"Obviously it is the inaugural event and it is going to be a different experience but I will be doing four events and I will be aiming to get medals in all four," said Kindred.

"It is pretty exciting and I would say 90 per cent of my training is geared towards short course rather than long course so it will be nice to see what it is exactly like racing short course at elite level.

"The turns in short course swimming play a big role and a lot of swimmers aren't as good at them as they should be and as a result lose time.

"But training over short course for a long time now has obviously helped my turns greatly and hopefully I can utilise that in Rio.

"Most of our meets are over 50 metres and not 25 so it is going to be different but I can't wait to get started and hopefully in turn it will improve the long course side of things."

Kindred was joined in Iceland by partner Nyree Lewis but she won't be at the World Short Course Championships in Rio after she failed to receive the nod from British selectors.

The 28-year-old upgraded the 100m backstroke silver she won at the Paralympics in Beijing last summer to gold in Reykjavik - but is adamant she won't be missing out by not travelling to Rio.

"I missed out by quite a narrow margin and obviously I would have liked to have gone and competed against the best in the world," said Lewis.

"But saying that I am not too sure if any of the bigger and better swimmers are going, next year is the main focus with the World Long Course Championships in August.

"I have been riding high after doing well at the Europeans and I'll have to make sure I stay focused in the pool as I can't be with Sascha and the other British guys."

More Than The Games / Eurosport

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