Continuing on the theme of “Fife Futures” and the ones to watch, the focus of this article is on teenager Cameron Hemphill from Ladybank and Bell Baxter HS. Cameron is a member of Carnegie Swimming Club, having started out in DSF sessions at Cupar and Glenrothes, before moving to Cupar and District and then on to InCas. Cameron is Fife’s leading physically disabled Para swimmer living in Fife.
Throughout his career, Cameron has been tremendously well supported by all members of his family and more recently his strength and conditioning programme has been supervised by Stuart Bizzarri from the Fife Sports and Leisure Trust. Cameron was introduced to competitive swimming at the Disability Sport Fife swimming championships.
Cameron’s 6 year journey to date:
- November 2013 First SDS Junior Swimming Championships Grangemouth
- November 2014 Second SDS Junior Champs November Grangemouth
- Cameron’s first classification in June 2016 = S10 SB9 SM10
- Following classification Cameron is invited to join Scottish Squad
- National Para-swimming Championships 2016 in Manchester
- Move to InCAS to train under Garrie Roberts, and an increase in training intensity
- Awarded most improved swimmer trophy at the 2017 Disability Sport Fife Annual Awards
- Cameron with Garrie at the Scottish Open Swimming Championships in 2018 at Tollcross – Glasgow
- Cameron competing at his first British Para Swimming International Meet 2019 at Tollcross.
In six years Cameron Hemphill has progressed brilliantly in para swimming and is currently a young ambassador with Scottish Swimming. Commitment, determination and strong family support are key to success and Cameron has it all in abundance. Disability Sport Fife is proud to have played a part in Cameron’s journey to date and recognises that this young man still has so much to offer.
These are challenging times for para swimmers without access to water but Cameron is fully committed to his home based land training and this hopefully will keep him on track until normality returns.
Richard Brickley OBE MBE Chairman DSF (SCIO ) Board of Charity Trustees