Sienna Robinson hoping for British Championships redemption a year on from rupturing appendix in pool

Robinson feared it was something more. She had been in agony on the opening day of the national championships, but still qualified for the 50m final.

“That night I was getting more and more ill; shaking, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move properly, throwing up and passing out,” remembers Robinson.

“People kept saying to me you’re just nervous, but I knew I couldn’t be that nervous.”

The following day she had enough strength to swim the 200m breaststroke, touching the wall seconds before future European Junior 200m individual medley champion Leah Schlosshan from just up the road at the City of Leeds club.

It wasn’t Robinson’s fastest swim, enough to qualify for another final, but considering what her body was going through, a remarkable achievement.

Because during that race, Robinson’s appendix ruptured.

“I went back home, I couldn’t even sit up, I lost the ability to move,” Robinson tells The Yorkshire Post.

“I was rushed into hospital with a rupturing appendix, sepsis and had to have an operation that day.”

It brought her British Championships in her home pool of Ponds Forge to an abrupt halt, and almost threatened the rest of her season.

The repercussions from the surgery slowed the recovery process.

“My stomach had been cut open so I couldn’t turn properly in the water for ages,” she remembers.

“I was told I couldn’t lift weights for risk of giving myself a hernia.”

Despite all that, this daughter of the Steel City who had only taken up swimming properly four years earlier, is made of sterner stuff.

Within three months she was competing at the European Junior Championships in Bucharest, finishing fourth in four separate disciplines.

“Upsetting though it was at the time to miss out on a medal, off little to no training, it kind of gave me a bit of extra confidence,” reveals Robinson, who has been emboldened by the experience.

“Last year, everything was about the swimming - I was constantly questioning have I done everything I can. Then being in hospital when I should have been racing really opened my eyes to the fact I did do everything I can, but some things that happen are just inevitable and out of your control. It’s really changed my mindset. And going into nationals this year I realise I have given everything I can. It’s not made me more confident but it’s made me more assured that I have done everything in my power and within reason.”

The redemption tour begins on Tuesday morning in the heats of the 50m breaststroke, back in her home pool of Ponds Forge on the first morning of the 2023 British Championships.

“I feel like I’m the fittest and strongest I’ve ever been,” says Robinson, who returned to 100 per cent fitness in January.

“Having the time out wasn’t ideal, it impacted my swimming, but it has also helped me come back stronger and more mentally determined than ever.

“So I now look at it as ‘well it could be worse, I could still be ill’.”

Due to a recent decision by governing body World Aquatics to redraw the age classifications, Robinson - now 18 - might get another shot at the European Junior Championships in Belgrade in July.

“The thought of being able to do European Juniors off the back of what happened last year, and possibly get a medal, would be very nice,” she smiles.

An added incentive would be to do it with her sister Shola, a year younger, a medley swimmer and also a late developer. Shola, like Sienna, started swimming competitively, age 13, after being delayed a year following an operation on her arm.

Now free of the hospital wards of Sheffield, a family trip to Belgrade would be much cause for celebration. As would a visit later in July to Fukuoka, for the senior World Aquatics Championships.

“It would be absolutely incredible if I could make the world championship squad,” says the elder Robinson, who hopes to be cheered on this week by her tutors at Sheffield College, who she says have supported her through the ups and downs of the last year.

“That’s what I’m striving for this week. If I’ve given 100 per cent of myself but still don’t make it, I’ll still be proud of myself.

“And then Paris next year would be lovely. That’s the aim. If I don’t make worlds this year I’ve got to set my sights on the Olympics. That’s everyone’s dream.

“I’m not going to say I just swim for the Olympics because I don’t; I swim because I love it.

"I love challenging myself, a swimming session gives me the best buzz ever.”

The British Championships run from Tuesday to Sunday. For tickets visit here.