Meet the team for Glasgow 2014 - Women's 4x100m Freestyle Relay Team

The women’s 4x100m relay team for Glasgow 2014 has a strong Wellingtonian presence with all but one of the four team members hailing from the capital city.

Samantha Lee, Samantha Lucie-Smith and Ellen Quirke are all from Capital Swim Club and are part of the Wellington Regional High Performance Centre, while Laura Quilter, originally from Gisborne, is from North Shore Swimming in Auckland.

“We are all excited to race,” said Laura. “Two weeks today, the team feels confident and are enjoying training in Spain. Finally starting to feel some speed!

“I particularly like the dynamic between the four of us. I feel like it will really help us to excel in Glasgow.”

This quartet was part of a fairy-tale ending to the New Zealand Open Championships earlier this year when they bettered the Commonwealth Games qualifying time by a second in the final event of the competition, the 4x100m freestyle relay.

Although all four are similar in age they have varying histories in their swimming career, Samantha Lucie-Smith the only one to attend the London 2012 Olympic Games where she competed in the 4x200m freestyle relay.

The two Samantha’s, who’s birthdays are only two days apart, have moved along the most similar paths both beginning their career as part of the 2008 and 2009 Trans-Tasman Tri Series teams and the 2009 Junior Pan Pacific team and last year were on the team for the 15^th FINA World Championships in Barcelona together.

Laura is the current New Zealand champion in the 50m butterfly and 50m freestyle and is also the age group record holder in the 17 year old 50m backstroke. She has previously competed at the 2011 USA Grand Prix, 2012 US Open Championships and the 2013 World University Games.

Ellen is the only one of the four not currently living in New Zealand, choosing to study at Texas A&M University in the United States. She is also part of the University’s swim team where the girls’ squad she is on went undefeated in their dual meet season before the NZ Open Championships this year.

Find out more about Samantha L-S, Samantha L, Ellen and Laura.