Swimming Australia has announced a roster of 30 athletes and 7 coaches for the 2025 World Junior Swimming Championships. The event will take place from August 19-24 in Otopeni, Romania.
This is the exact same roster size as the one Australia sent to the 2023 Championships, which ultimately put five swimmers on the 2024 Olympic team: Iona Anderson, Jaclyn Barclay, Jamie Perkins, Flynn Southam, Olivia Wunsch.
This year’s team is headlined by Sienna Toohey, who led six swimmers under the breaststroke qualifying times at the selection meet, the Australian Age and Open Championships, earlier this month.
The 16-year-old won four gold and set two national records including a head-turning 1:07.04 in the girls 100m breaststroke that broke Dolphins’ great Leisel Jones 23-year-old national age record (1:07.31). She then backed this up with a national record in the 50m breaststroke (30.73).
The youngest swimmers on the team are Christopher Montana, 15, from Trinity Grammar and Heidi Shumack, 15, from SOPAC, while the eldest is WA’s Tex Cross, Qld’s Oliver Linde and NSW’s Jessica Cole – all 18 years of age.
Cole is the lone returning member of the 2023: she finished 5th in the 200 fly in Netanya in 2023. That Australian team finished 2nd in the overall medal standings behind the United States with 9 gold, 7 silver, and 8 bronze medals. That was the country’s most ever total medals at this meet (24), though they did win 1 more gold in 2013 to lead the medals table.
“With the tightening up of qualifying times, I’d like to see a greater percentage of athletes qualifying for finals, and also a greater percentage of conversions, and by this I mean an improvement in their times from national age championships through to Junior World Championship finals,” said the squad’s head coach Simon Cusack.
Led by Cusack, team coaches selected for the tour are: Ashley Delaney (St Andrews), Deb Jones (Fenix), James Greathead (SOPAC), John Jordan (Bendigo East), Tom Fraser-Holmes (Griffith Uni) and Wayne Gould (Albury). Brooke Kemp, WA, will also join the team as a scholarship coach.
| AUSTRALIAN JUNIOR DOLPHINS | ||
| Athlete | Club | Coach |
| Male Athletes | ||
| Henry Allan | Bendigo East | John Jordan |
| Joshua Conias | Somerville House | Tim Lane |
| Ben Cotroneo | Kincoppal-Rose Bay | Hamid Mobarraz |
| Tex Cross | Highlanders | Ryan Steenkamp |
| Lucas Fackerell | Arena | Harry Clarke |
| Oliver Linde | Nudgee College | Stewart Melton |
| Charlie Lutton | Brisbane Grammar | Bobby Jovanovich |
| Cash Milner | St Andrews | Ashley Delaney |
| Ollie Moclair | Cranbrook | Tom Sunter |
| Christopher Montana | Trinity Grammar | Ben Tuxford |
| Jack Morrow | St Andrews – Qld (Vic jnr) | Ashley Delaney |
| Alexander Sillitoe | South Lake Dolphins | Stefano Di Bernardo |
| Thomas Sutherland | Caulfield Grammar | Kenrick Monk |
| Campbell Wilson-Moran | Caulfield Grammar | Kenrick Monk |
| Female Athletes | ||
| Zoe Ammundsen | Nudgee College | Shaun Crown |
| Mikayla Bird | Bond | Kyle Samuelson |
| Heli Childs | PLC SYDNEY | Brent Winkworth |
| Jessica Cole | Wests Illawarra | Patrick Stellino |
| Olivia Hine | Somerville House | Sarah Caithness |
| Rafaela Kopellou | SOPAC | Adam Kable |
| Kira Long | SOPAC | James Greathead |
| Hayley Mackinder | Griffith Uni – Qld (Vic jnr) | Tom Fraser – Holmes |
| Alice Monaghan | Griffith Uni | Tom Fraser – Holmes |
| Julia Remington | All Saints | Ken Sabotic |
| Asha Ring | SOPAC | James Greathead |
| Isabel Sheldrick | Fenix | Deb Jones |
| Heidi Shumack | SOPAC | James Greathead |
| Amelie Smith | Rocky City | Shane Kingston |
| Sienna Toohey | Albury | Wayne Gould |
| Ainsley Trotter | Bond – Qld (Vic jnr) | Chris Mooney |
| Coaches | ||
| Simon Cusack | National Youth Coach | |
| Ashley Delaney | St Andrews | |
| Deb Jones | Fenix | |
| James Greathead | SOPAC | |
| John Jordan | Bendigo East | |
| Tom Fraser-Holmes | Griffith Uni | |
| Wayne Gould | Albury | |
Let’s go Sienna