Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ

This was definitely the best Paralympic swimming meet I have ever been to in terms of quality of the races.

There were some great individual gold medals - three from people who have been here before, , and and they came back and did a good job.

And three from first timers , and of course , plus the relay as well.

Beijing

I was really looking forward to Friday's in the Water Cube because I thought it would be a head-to-head between Britain's Sam Hynd and Wang Xiaofu, China's flag-bearer at the opening ceremony.

The form of a couple of months ago indicated that would be where the action was. The race didn't quite pan out like that.

Sam went really well in the morning and broke his own world record and it was good for him to push himself so hard in the heats. More often at you need to put in strong performances in the heats and the finals.

Having competed at the last five Paralympic Games it will be a new experience for me to be a spectator in Beijing. However, as a commentator I will still be close to the action and be able to speak to the team each day.

Trying to pick out ones to watch from the incredibly strong British swimming team is difficult.

Just to qualify onto the team you had to be ranked at least sixth in the world and it is a team that topped the medal table at the 2006 IPC World Championships.

I am a and will be providing analysis of the swimming events at the .

When I was 17 I had my left leg amputated because of cancer. The day after I had my stitches out I went swimming and within a year I was swimming quicker with one leg than I did when I had two. Eighteen months after finishing my chemotherapy I was selected to represent .

I competed internationally for 17 years, winning .

I also held world records for 200m, 400m and 1500m freestyle and as well as being part of the team that held the world record for 4x100m freestyle.