Karen Denise Pickering,
MBE (born 19 December 1971) is a former
freestyle swimmer from
Great Britain
Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It i ...
.
Swimming career
She made her international senior debut in 1986. She was first selected to represent her country at the European Junior Championships. Pickering competed in four consecutive
Summer Olympics, starting in
1992.
She won her first medal in 1993, at the inaugural
1993 FINA Short Course World Championships in
Palma de Mallorca, where she won the gold medal in the 200 m freestyle. With that performance Pickering became Britain's first
swimming
Swimming is the self-propulsion of a person through water, or other liquid, usually for recreation, sport, exercise, or survival. Locomotion is achieved through coordinated movement of the limbs and the body to achieve hydrodynamic thrust that r ...
world champion.
She was a member of the British swimming squad from 1986 to 2005 and has a collection that includes 8 World Championship medals (4 gold), 14 European Championship medals, 38 National Championship titles, and a Commonwealth Games medal haul of 13 including 4 gold. The
2002 Commonwealth Games
The 2002 Commonwealth Games, officially known as the XVII Commonwealth Games and commonly known as Manchester 2002 were held in Manchester, England, from 25 July to 4 August, 2002. The 2002 Games were to be hosted in the United Kingdom to coin ...
saw Karen win three medals, two gold and one silver, in front of her home crowd, a career highlight which was crowned with the honour of carrying the English flag at the closing ceremony.
She is a two times winner of the
British Championship in the 50 metres freestyle (1992 and 1993), seven times winner of the
100 metres freestyle
The 100 metre freestyle is often considered to be the highlight ( Blue Ribbon event) of the sport of swimming, like 100 metres in the sport of Athletics.
The first swimmer to break the one-minute barrier (long course) was Johnny Weissmuller, in ...
(1989-1993, 1997, 2000), nine times winner of the
200 metres freestyle (1990, 1992–1995, 1997, 1999 and 2002–2003) and was the
400 metres freestyle champion in 1992, 2002 and 2003.
Honours
For her services to swimming Karen was awarded an MBE in the 1994 New Years Honours List.
[
Pickering is the Sports Ambassador for ]Ipswich
Ipswich () is a port town and borough in Suffolk, England, of which it is the county town. The town is located in East Anglia about away from the mouth of the River Orwell and the North Sea. Ipswich is both on the Great Eastern Main Line ...
in Suffolk, and chaired the British Athletes Commission between 2004 and 2016.
See also
* List of World Aquatics Championships medalists in swimming (women)
* List of Commonwealth Games medallists in swimming (women)
This is a list of women's Commonwealth Games medallists in swimming from 1930 to 2022.
Current program
50 metre freestyle
100 metre freestyle
200 metre freestyle
400 metre freestyle
800 metre freestyle
50 metre backstroke
100 metre ...
* World record progression 4 × 200 metres freestyle relay
In its most general sense, the term "world" refers to the totality of entities, to the whole of reality or to everything that is. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the worl ...
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pickering, Karen
1971 births
Living people
English female swimmers
Sportspeople from Brighton
Sportspeople from Ipswich
Olympic swimmers of Great Britain
Swimmers at the 1992 Summer Olympics
Swimmers at the 1996 Summer Olympics
Swimmers at the 2000 Summer Olympics
Swimmers at the 2004 Summer Olympics
Commonwealth Games gold medallists for England
Commonwealth Games silver medallists for England
Commonwealth Games bronze medallists for England
Swimmers at the 1990 Commonwealth Games
Swimmers at the 1994 Commonwealth Games
Swimmers at the 1998 Commonwealth Games
Swimmers at the 2002 Commonwealth Games
British female freestyle swimmers
World Aquatics Championships medalists in swimming
Medalists at the FINA World Swimming Championships (25 m)
European Aquatics Championships medalists in swimming
Commonwealth Games medallists in swimming
Members of the Order of the British Empire
Medallists at the 1990 Commonwealth Games
Medallists at the 1994 Commonwealth Games
Medallists at the 1998 Commonwealth Games
Medallists at the 2002 Commonwealth Games