MOUNT Kelly’s director of swimming has been honoured for her work as a coach with youngsters at the inaugural West Country Women Awards.

Emma Collings-Barnes coaches the next generation of competitive swimmers at the independent school in Tavistock.

She won the ‘women in sport category’ which was judged by multiple award winning Olympic swimmer Sharron Davies, herself an alumni of Mount Kelly.

Former competitive GB team swimmer Emma in fact hails from Skipton in North Yorkshire, but has lived in the South West for years. The Loughborough University graduate came to Mount Kelly in 2012 and has been coaching Olympic hopefuls every since.

The awards ceremony held at the Crowne Plaza in Plymouth saw women honoured in 15 categories at a gala dinner on December 1.

They recognise the achievements of women in many fields in Devon and Cornwall, hosted by award co-founders Alexis Bowater OBE and Tess Stuber.

Emma said she was ‘humbled’ to be given the award. Sharron Davies wasn’t able to attend the ceremony in person, but she did appear over video link.

‘I don’t know who nominated me. What I find quite funny is that I’m not from the South West at all. I’m actually from Yorkshire, I’m an ex GB swimmer myself.Once I retired, I missed it so much that I started coaching.

‘I moved to Milfield [school in Somerset] to work there and from there I migrated further south, moving to Kelly in 2012 as one of the coaches. I became the director of swimming in 2018.’

Her arrival at Mount Kelly – then Kelly College – ten years ago coinided with London’s Olympic Games.

The school was subsequently successful in obtaining lottery funding for a 50- metre Olympic legacy pool, a training facility for competitive swimmers in the area.Here, Emma has built on Kelly’s reputation for nuturuing talent among them Olympic bronze medallist Federico Burdisso.’

Emma said: ‘It is very much a values-led programme; we take responsibility for the development of human beings and they develop as swimmers from that. I think coaching is about coaching the person. Mount Kelly’s reputation for nuturing Olympic, which stretches back years, attracts young people with competitive swimming ambitions. Thirty per cent are boarders, with many coming as much for the swimming reputation of the curriculum as the academic side.’

She said her own experience as a Team GB swimmer helped her idenitfy with the youngsters juggling schoolwork and pool training.

‘Particularly with the boarders, we are mum or dad as much as coach and mentor , we spend a lot of time getting to know them as people,’ said Emma.‘It is that that we do best, coaching the person and the performances will come from that.’