THE highly anticipated 50-metre Olympic legacy pool at Mount Kelly in Tavistock is expected to be under cover by the end of this month.

The frame for the building which will house the pool is in place and the facility is set for completion next summer.

The multi-million pound project has been made possible by Sport England National Lottery funding of more than £700,000 and hopes are high that the new eight-lane pool will encourage the next generation of Olympic swimmers.

The pool will be one of only 30-35 50-metre pools in the UK, with the majority in universities or cities, and the first of its type to be contructed in the UK since London 2012.

Mount Kelly has helped to develop, coach and educate some of the top swimmers in the country over the past 35 years. During that time the school has produced more than 60 international swim-mers, with 19 of those competing at the Olympic and Common-wealth Games, winning six Olympic and nine Commonwealth medals respectively.

The college’s swimmers have experienced similar success in the paralympic games, winning five medals in Beijing and a further five at the 2012 games in London.

Jon Baker, project manager of Devon Contractors, said: ‘The development should be undercover by the end of November.

‘We will have an electric motor pump as it is much quieter and the steelwork has been painted with a white oxide paint which has a life span of 20 years.

‘At the moment there are 12 men working on the site, which could go up to more than 40 once we get watertight. The pool will be two metres deep at the deep end and 1.2 metres deep at the shallow end. The shallow end slabs should be in before Christmas.

‘A lot of people have asked us why we aren’t digging but we actually dig a little and then build back up to form the pool.’

Alistair Gove, chairman of the 50-metre pool task and finish group at Mount Kelly, said: ‘The changing rooms will adjoin to the existing pool and there will be secure access from the road and disabled access also.

‘The configuration of the changing rooms is all in accordance with Sport England.’

Alistair also said that the pool would be a community resource as well as one for the school, with a projection of 40% of the pool’s use by the college and 60% external users.

He said that the pool could provide private access for swimmers in the evening as they were currently only able to access 40 pools in Devon and 10 in Cornwall.

He added: ‘We will expect swimming clubs to come from up the country — there are hundreds of swimming classes in the UK and they often go to Lanzarote or Majorca to train.

‘We already run two swimming weeks but now we plan to have two in the Easter holidays.

‘We have had Olympian repres-entatives since 1980, including Sharon Davis and Andy Jameson. We also work a lot with the Paralympic Asso-ciation and the national society. There is a 50-metre swimming pool in Plymouth (Life Centre) but it’s nearly full the whole time, running at maximum capacity.’

Chair of governors Chris Snow said: ‘Part of our vision is creating a swimming hub capable of producing Olympic swimmers and long course swimmers. I always thought it was quite easy to build a swimming pool – just dig a hole and put the water in but it’s not quite that simple.’

He added that he believed that there were three major strands to the success of the development, the first being the cost and business side of the construction, the second being completed in a certain amount of time and also the business of pastoral and academic support and academic delivery.

He said: ‘All three of those parts have to work for this to be financially viable. Then we can look at this in 25 years and consider how we can take another step.

‘On the commercial side, the accommodation at the college supports the pool so visitors can stay and use the pool.

‘This has not just been a Mount Kelly effort, there has been a lot of effort to get this far. West Devon Borough Council, Sport England and Devon Construction helped us significantly – if they had not come together we wouldn’t have it. We hope it will be a lasting legacy for Tavistock and Mount Kelly and West Devon.’

Devon County Councillor Debo Sellis said: ‘The pool is really positive for increasing local community business.’

She said she was pleased the community could share in the pool.

‘Mount Kelly has invested in the local community and economy,’ she added.