Nick Gillingham

Olympic Games

Gillingham participated in three consecutive Summer Olympics, starting in 1988. At the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, he won the silver medal in the 200-metre breaststroke in a Commonwealth Record of 2:14.12 narrowly missing the World Record,^[1] followed by a bronze medal in the same event four years later swimming inside the Olympic Record at the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona setting another Commonwealth Record of 2:11.29.^[2] Although better known as a 200m breaststroke swimmer, Gillingham was also a world class 100m swimmer and was ranked first in the world in 1992 with his Commonwealth Record of 1:01.33 from the British Olympic trials. However, he sustained a leg injury to his groin during the Olympics which impaired his performance in the 100m final where he finished 7th, half a second slower than his heat time.^[3]

Commonwealth Games

Gillingham won six Commonwealth Games medals; he represented England and won a bronze medal in the 200 metres breaststroke, at the 1986 Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh, Scotland.^[4] Four years later he represented England and won two bronze medals in the 100 metres and 200 metres breaststroke, at the 1990 Commonwealth Games in Auckland, New Zealand.^[5] At the 1994 Commonwealth Games he won the gold medal in the 200 metres breaststroke, the silver medal in the 100 metres breaststroke and a bronze medal in the medley relay.^[6]

Other

On 18th August 1989 in the European Championships, he swam to a World Record world record in the long-course 200-metre breaststroke in a time of 2:12.90,^[7] only to hold it for almost two days before the American Mike Barrowman, lowered the record again to 2:12.89.

A World Record holder both long course and short course. He also won the world title at the first inaugural 1993 FINA Short Course World Championships in Palma de Mallorca. He broke three world, ten European, nine Commonwealth and seventeen British records during his career and won 17 major championship medals along with multiple World Cup gold medals and the European Open gold.

He dominated the ASA National Championships in the breaststroke events, and won the 100 metres breaststroke title in 1992 and 1993 ^[8][9] and the 200 metres breaststroke on nine occasions (1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994 and 1996).^{[10][11][12][13][14][15][16]}