A TEENAGER from Rayleigh will compete against the country’s top swimmers at the national championships in Sheffield today.

Verity Goodey will bid for glory in the 50m backstroke and 50m butterfly at the ASA British Gas ASA National Championships at Ponds Forge International Sports Centre.

The 19-year-old, a member of the Borough of Southend Swimming (BOSS) club, will rub shoulders with Olympic, Commonwealth, and European champions as they bid to book their spots in the British squad for next month’s world championships in Shanghai.

She said: “I want to compete at the very highest level, and to make it to the world championships or Olympics one day.

“But it is going to take a lot of very hard work and training to achieve that.

“But being at the nationals with the likes of Rebecca Adlington and Lizzie Simmonds is great experience for me.

“And if I can make a final in Sheffield, I will be happy with that.”

Goodey also qualified for the national championships in Sunderland last year, and in doing so became the first Southend representative to compete at that level since Sarah Hardcastle and Natalie Brown more than a decade ago.

Despite struggling with an ongoing shoulder injury, in November she set two new Essex records in the backstroke (29.45s) and butterfly (29.05s) sprints at the East Region Winter Championships in Norwich.

She is one of only two swimmers from Essex who will compete in Sheffield, the other is Shenfield swimmer Roberto Pavoni, who has already swam at the Commonweath Games and European Championships.

And Goodey will have her work cut out in two strong line-ups as she bids to book one of the ten final spots available in both races.

She is strongest in the butterfly and if she qualifies for the final she will probably get to test herself against Fran Halsall, who won Commonwealth gold with a national record of 26.19 in India last year.

Goodey, who works as a life guard at Garon Park diving and swimming centre in Eastern Avenue, Southend, said: “If I am going to compete at the highest level then I need to race the best.

“And I’ll need to bring my times down to the 27-second mark, and to do that I’ll need to improve my concentration and my strength by increasing my training.”