Kelso swimmer Jasper Harrison targeting Scottish medal at fourth time of asking
Kelso teenager Jasper Harrison tried out lots of different sports as a youngster and ended up sticking with swimming, but that wasn’t a decision prompted by any grand ambition to make waves in the pool and prove himself a splash hit at national competitions.
“It was the only one I was good at,” said the 16-year-old with disarming modesty.
“I was too small for the others, and when you’re small, you can swim but you can’t play rugby – you just get thrown around.”
His self-deprecation remains intact despite having set records, won medals won and, with help from Scottish Borders Council’s athlete support programme, gone from striving for qualifying times to represent the east of Scotland to sitting second in the country in his class and closing in on a Scottish medal, as well as aspring to take part in major international games.
Harrison says he tried “basically everything” – including rugby, judo and hockey – before swimming in general and the butterfly stroke in particular won out.
Neither of his parents ever swam competitively, his dad having dabbled in karate before taking up ultra-marathon running in his 30s and his mum having ridden horses, so there was no family blueprint to follow in settling upon a sport.
He joined Kelso Amateur Swimming Club aged nine and, as his talent began to make itself evident, was invited to join the Borders Elite Swim Team, known as Best for short, coached initially by Robyn Methven and then fellow Kelso club alumnus Kirsty Armstrong.
After making it into east of Scotland and Scottish championships at 13, his ambition expanded and he literally dove into early-morning Best sessions, upping his schedule at Kelso pool and in the gym too.
It worked, as he went from 34th place at 100m butterfly at swimming’s Scottish national age-group championships to fourth a year later.
“I started doing backstroke but then found I naturally had the rhythm for butterfly,” he said.
“It’s just practice, lots of drills and pull-ups, a strong upper body to pull you through, and that’s why I had to work harder in the gym.”
Three successive fourth-place finishes at Scottish level – at 50m and 100m fly and 50m free – have sharpened his appetite rather than dented it, and this year he claimed two silver medals and a bronze at his sport’s Scottish summer meet at Aberdeen in July, as well as breaking Ryan Brown’s long-standing club record by clocking 25.72 seconds for 50m butterfly.
Brown competed in British and European events and was Britain’s top fly swimmer at under-18 level before a serious knee injury curtailed his progress and he is now an inspiration to his fellow Kelso swimmer.
Elite swimming becomes more competitive in later teen years but that’s a challenge Harrison is meeting head on with a training week featuring six pool sessions – three mornings training with Best at Selkirk, waking at 4am to be poolside by 5.30am, eating breakfast in the car on the way to school, and three evenings training with his Kelso club – and gym sessions on top in Galashiels and in his family’s garage at home.
It’s been a testing year out of the water too due to Best operating without a head coach, with his dad Jonathan and fellow parents stepping in to keep things running until Maria Young took over that vacant post this month.
Harrison’s development over recent years has taught him what he needs to do to push to remain among the best swimmers in the country while managing training, injuries and rest, and he credits provision of a personal trainer via the athlete support programme for his progress, along with financial assistance from the Galashiels-based Rowan Boland Memorial Trust.
“They are both great and I wouldn’t be where I am without that support,” he said.
“From the athlete support programme, I get free physio and training once a week at Tribe Fitness in Galashiels, and that’s been really helpful because my knees have been getting sore with training.
“Having someone there who knows about strength and conditioning, and how to look after your body, means I’m not going too heavy when I shouldn’t. That’s been huge for me to learn.”
With the summer season now behind him and no competing until short-course championships in December and east district ones to follow, Harrison is looking to the future and targeting another British final at butterfly next year and an elusive first Scottish medal after three years of just missing out by finishing fourth, as well as setting his sights on 2030’s centenary Commonwealth Games in India.
“It is all about just improving, I think, step by step,” added the Kelso High School pupil.
“Of course, we’re all aiming for the Commonwealth Games and Olympics, and the Commonwealths in four years’ time would be amazing.
“I have a lot of work to do before then, but considering I’ve gone from not even making east of Scotland to being second in Scotland in four years, I definitely feel like I can push for it and see where I get to.”