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Swimmer Fran Halsall on being Xena: Warrior Princess, resilient and preparing for a third Olympics

Fran Halsall is gunning for success at her third Olympics

She describes herself on Twitter as 70 per cent professional athlete, 10 per cent rockstar and the rest involves doughnuts.

Outside of the pool, swimmer Fran Halsall admits to showing off, dancing at every opportunity, listening to 70s rock and taking her hairy hound Blu to important meetings.

In the coming weeks, that 70 per cent will rise for the GB star who has qualified for her third Olympics and was recently Queen of the European Championships, winning five medals, including three gold. But don't think the fun will completely cease in Brazil.

The Southport-born 26-year-old opens up about her character in and out of the water, how the pain of missing out on a medal at London 2012 is driving her on and how being Sky Academy Sports Scholar boosted her.


If I had to sum myself up, I'd say confident, smiley and resilient. I'm Xena: Warrior Princess!

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It's just that I can be a bit of a diva when I want to be. My coach would suggest I like to be the centre of attention - or a show off!

If there was karaoke on I'd be the one dancing. I love music - from Deep Purple to Taylor Swift. It depends on what mood I'm. I like to listen to gangsta rap before I race. I won't be the one with my head down and headphones on, I'll be the one singing trying to get everybody to sing along with me!

What I've learnt in over 10 years on the British team is that being resilient is a very important part of being an athlete.

Adam Peaty, Chris Walker-Hebborn, Francesca Halsall and Siobhan-Marie O'Connor
Image: Halsall (second right) and current Scholar Siobhan-Marie O'Connor (right) enjoyed relay glory at the Euros

It's how you deal with the poor performances and not meeting targets and turning it into a positive. Not achieving hurts but it's the analysing what you did right and what you did wrong. The quicker you understand that the better it will be for you to move forward in your career.

That was the main thing that followed London 2012. That was hard and every athlete's dream is to win an Olympic medal so it took time to deal with that. Now I'm just excited to be going to another Olympics.

The London Games was an amazing experience in front of a home crowd and watching everybody else in Team GB in all the other sports. But I missed a medal by 0.08 seconds in the 50m freestyle.

So London was a bitter / sweet experience for me. My race I just didn't get right and I was very disappointed. I took two months off after the Olympics and reassessed everything.

I got a new coach and a new programme and set myself new targets and became more focused on the 50 rather than the 100. I won a bronze at the World Championships in Barcelona so that was a nice year after London.

Xena: Warrior Princess is probably pretty handy in the pool as well
Image: Xena: Warrior Princess is probably pretty handy in the pool as well

It was all about taking some of the pressure off and enjoying it again. I was delighted with that.

Being on the Scholarship scheme in the build-up to the 2012 Games was amazing for me though. Even after London I came back to Sky Sports and did work experience.

I'm interested in the media and what happens behind the scenes so I learnt loads of things like how to build and develop a story. I met some of the presenters and looked at all these things thinking about what I could do after my swimming career.

The link with Sky and getting access to that has been brilliant.

Seeing my big face on the billboards was interesting! Luckily I had goggles on so you couldn't tell it was me so much!

One of the other Scholars Liam Tancock trains in my squad and I've got a great relationship with him. It's been amazing sharing experiences and talking about preparations and getting an insight to other athletes and what they go through. That's all been fantastic.

Fran Halsall impressed at the European Championships in London
Image: Fran secured five medals at the European Championships in London

The last few weeks in the pool have been great. I did really well at the Europeans and I got through the Rio trials which is actually tougher than the Olympics.

It's all about qualifying and I did! It was a good week. After January I put in plenty of work and hopefully that should stand me in good stead for this Olympic cycle.

It's the 11th time I've won at a British Championships and so it's like a time trial rather than an actual race. I find it hard to get myself up for it and motivated.

You think about a World Championship or Commonwealth Games when all the best swimmers are there and the atmosphere is electric. In a race like a 50m sprint that helps. You get the extra adrenaline and atmosphere builds.

At a trials there are few people watching like it's just mum and dad in the stands! I find that difficult. I'm just so pleased I was able to put in a world class performance.

Most of us didn't know we had made the Rio squad until a week after. For London it was announced there and then and there was a parade which was nice but it was good getting all emotional telling my parents I'd made Rio on the phone.

Fran Halsall and her trusty four-legged friend Blu
Image: Fran and her trusty four-legged friend Blu

I'm very excited about the Olympics but I don't want to get too excited too soon! I want to build it up nicely. Now we've had the Euros it starts to get tense with a big block of work. I just want to make sure my skills are right and my fitness is good.

I'm not thinking about Olympic medals or anything like that. It's just about getting from A to B. Having said that, if I got on the podium there would be some Prosecco and I'd be with my boyfriend, parents and my dog.

My dog is a sproodle - a cross between an English Springer Spaniel and Poodle. He's crazy as anything but he's so cute. He comes everywhere with me - he even came to Glasgow for the trials.

He also goes into the changing rooms at the rugby with my boyfriend [St Helens rugby league captain Jon Wilkin]. He'll also have a haircut with me at the same time and I take him to meetings with solicitors - he's more of a rock star than me.

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