WATCH: Inverness teenage swimmer called to represent Great Britain squad for the World Down Syndrome Swimming Championship

A teenager from Inverness has been selected to represent Great Britain for the World Down Syndrome Swimming Championship in Turkey next year.

Matthew McCreadie, (19), was born prematurely with Down Syndrome and has since overcome various medical hurdles, but has always been very 'motivated and determined' to try numerous sports.

The young athlete demonstrated a real passion for competitive swimming when growing up, and soon decided that it would become his focus despite being 'late' to competitive swimming, especially compared to his GB team-mates.

In October of 2021 he was invited to training sessions across the United Kingdom with the Down Syndrome Great Britain Team and he was officially invited to join the team last year.

Matthew is currently the only Scottish male swimmer presently in the Down Syndrome GB team.

Recently he appeared in a European Championships where he competed for the GB Team for the first time.

Now the youngster spends his days on the approach of the British and World Championships training tirelessly and shadowing a life guard a few days a week.

His mother, Susan said: "Matthew has worked extremely hard to improve his technique over the last few years, and now that he is back from the European Championships, his training has increased, as well as his swimming sessions.

"He has quite an arduous, few days over the weekend which will hopefully pay off."

When Matthew isn't swimming, he dedicates his time completing a Skills Builder’s course at college a few days a week, as well as working in the college café.

Matthews mum, Susan, described herself as her sons 'carer and right hand woman' throughout all the blood sweat and tears that has been poured into the teenagers professional swimming career.

Susan is always looking for new and exciting ways to get Matthew amped up for his competitions.

For his previous training, she created a map of Loch Ness, and everytime Mattthew swam a length they would put a small sticker on the map, meaning that in over a month’s time he swam the equivalent of Loch Ness.

The visual representation of his progress serves as a great way to visually see his progress over time.

Susan said: "I am already thinking of new ideas for the next map, which needs to be exciting and different to our previous charts."

While making it into the championships, Matthew and his family experience a great deal of difficulty travelling due to the expense of the trips and other training costs.

Susan said: "Unfortunately, we have been unable to secure any sports funding from any of the sporting bodies to help Matthew compete.

"Although he is representing Scotland and Great Britain in competitions there is no help available whilst we will have spent a staggering £9,000 in training, equipment, travel and other related costs (including his Italy competition) so far in 2023."

Due to this the McCreadie's 'somewhat hesitantly' set up a GoFundMe site to allow people the chance to support Matthews journey and regularly keep updated with the teenagers progress.

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