#Rio2016 | WA Swimmers Selected for Rio
Western Australian swimmers Jeremy McClure and Guy Harrison-Murray have today been officially selected onto the Australian Paralympic Team to compete at the 2016 Rio Games.
The Australian team will see 36 athletes compete in Rio, looking to emulate the feats of the 2012 team which returned home with 37 medals, including 18 gold.
29 year-old McClure will compete in a fourth Paralympics for Australia, having debuted in Athens in 2004 and represented Australia at each edition since.
The Bull Creek resident became legally blind over a 10-week period as a 15 year-old, after he was diagnosed with Leber hereditary optic neuropathy. Having been a keen sportsman growing up, he switched to swimming after his diagnosis to keep alive his sporting interests, and in 2015, also represented Australia in Para Triathlon.
Guy Harrison-Murray will make his Paralympic debut for Australia at 19 years of age, having moved to Perth with his family in 2011 from the UK.
Harrison-Murray was born with congenital bilateral talipes – a condition that left his feet twisted out of position, more commonly known as club foot.
Having shown considerable talent in swimming, Harrison-Murray was granted a distinguished talent visa, through the Department of Immigration and Citizenship and the City of Perth in 2015, which enabled him to earn Australian citizenship and be eligible for Rio for his adopted country.
That same year, Guy moved to Brisbane to train at the University of the Sunshine Coast which has seen him make his first Paralympic team for Australia.
Australian Paralympic Team Chef de Mission Kate McLoughlin believes the team selected to compete at Rio holds a strong contingent of budding talent, who will take on the challenge of continuing Australia’s proud history of success in the pool.
“Australia has had huge success in Paralympic swimming, from the first Games in 1960 in Rome, where the late Daphne Hilton won the country’s very first gold medal in the sport,” McLoughlin said.
“Although maintaining the edge we had in London will be tough, we only need to look at Australia’s success at last year’s World Championships to know that this team is in strong form.”
The swimming selections has seen WA’s officially selected numbers for Rio, rise to 11 athletes.
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