WITH London 2012 having announced her arrival onto the world stage, Teessider Aimee Willmott is hoping this summer’s Rio Olympics will prove the defining moment of her swimming career.

Willmott was still a teenager when she emulated her father, Stuart, by making her Olympic debut in London, and while she narrowly missed out on a place in the final of the 400m Individual Medley, her 11th-place finish still represented an extremely strong performance.

Since then, she has gone from strength to strength, finishing ninth in the 2013 World Championships and winning two individual silver medals at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, but there is still a sense of her immense promise not quite having been fulfilled.

That could change this summer, with Willmott having become the first North-East athlete to have their Olympic place confirmed when she was named on a 26-strong swimming squad for Rio last week, and while she is delighted to have been selected for her second Olympic experience, she will not be satisfied unless she does herself justice in Brazil.

“I’m at the peak age now and have the peak experience,” said Willmott, who left Middlesbrough around a year-and-a-half ago to relocate to one of British Swimming’s high-performance centres at the Olympic Aquatic Centre in London. “So from that point of view, this is probably going to be my best chance of doing really well at an Olympics.

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“I’m 23 now, and while that might seem young, in swimming terms it’s not really. I’ve got a lot of experience under my belt – not just at the Olympics, but also at Worlds and things like the Commonwealths too – and I just feel this is my time now.

“Four years ago, it felt like a massive achievement just to make the Olympic team, and with the Games being in London, it was such a big thing just to be part of it. I still feel proud to have been selected for Rio, but it’s a different feeling this time around. Being picked is just another step along the journey this time – it’s making a mark in Rio that counts.”

Willmott will once again contest the 400m IM, an event that pits her against British team-mate and long-term rival Hannah Miley. The pair battled out a close finish at the recent British trials, with Miley just coming out on top, and have spent most of their careers in direct competition.

In recent years, however, Willmott has also developed into something of a butterfly specialist, and after winning the 200m butterfly at the trials, she is hoping to be allowed to double up in Rio.

“The 400m IM will be the main focus, and that’s still the event I feel I’m strongest at,” she said. “But with winning the 200m fly as well, I’m hoping to be picked for that too.

“I put a fair bit of focus on that at the trials and thought I did well. I only swam in one event at London, and the whole thing was over in the blink of an eye. It would be nice to be in two events this time just to stretch the experience out a bit more.”

Willmott currently stands in fourth position in the 400m IM world rankings, but with a number of countries still to hold their Olympic trials, the order could change considerably before the start of Olympic competition.

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China’s Ye Shiwen broke the world record to win gold in London, and is likely to be one of the favourites again, while Hungary’s Katinka Hosszu has been in fine form this year after being edged out of the medals as she finished fourth four years ago.

Willmott accepts she will have to swim much faster than she did in London if she is to make the final in Rio, but expects a change in format to prove a crucial factor.

“The event has moved on and it’s going to be a lot quicker this time to make heats and finals,” she said. “But I think the time difference could be important.

“Normally, we swim heats in the morning and then finals in the early evening, but because of the scheduling in Rio, the heats will be in the afternoon and the final will be around midnight. That might not sound like a big difference, but it’s actually massive.

“We spend our whole lives swimming to a certain schedule so your body clock gets used to that. I’m normally in bed by about ten, so to be swimming a final at midnight is going to be a challenge. As a team, we’ll be factoring that into our training in the next few months to get us used to it.”

Willmott will head to a training camp in Dubai at the start of next month, before tackling the European Championships, which begin on May 16.

The Europeans represent an important stepping stone on the road to Rio, and are even more significant this year as they will be staged in the same London Aquatic Centre that Willmott now calls home.

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“It’ll be great to be back in the pool in a major competition again,” she said. “I’m sure some of the memories from 2012 will come flooding back, although that sometimes happens even when I’m just training.

“It’s a big competition, and it’ll be nice to get some really competitive racing in. The main thing is obviously Rio, but swimming well in London next month can only help in terms of preparing for the Olympics.”

* Aimee Willmott’s Olympic preparations are supported by the Middlesbrough & Teesside Philanthropic Foundation, Endeavour Partnership Lawyers, Baines Jewitt Accountants, Sapere Software, Handelsbanken and Active Financial Planners.