The AIS played host this week to a Swimming Australia talent identification camp, in the hope of discovering some future Olympians who may have otherwise flown under the radar.
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The swimmers were hand-picked by a selection of three coaches at the national age championships, not on results but how they looked in the water.
The idea was the brainchild of Australian Youth High Performance Coach, Vince Raleigh, who felt the juniors representing Australia ''are not always the most talented people for us in the long run''.
''The late developing athletes, the athletes who are maybe not exposed to much training, they are also talented, so I wanted to cast the net wider,'' Raleigh said.
''It's just about capturing, encouraging and keeping in our system people who haven't normally been identified.
''My experience with swimming is often the ones who represent us on our senior national teams, especially in the men's, but sometimes in the women, they're late maturers, so I'm hoping there will be quite a few here that we can project up towards the Rio team in 2016.''
Among the group were Canberra swimmers Ryan Hore and Cameron Tysoe, with Tysoe fitting Raleigh's bill exactly.
''He's probably not the one who's knocking out all the records at [nationals], but I think he has potential to certainly travel a lot further with his career in swimming,'' he said.
At 16, it was Tysoe's first experience at a national camp, and he was blown away by the experience.
''It was fantastic - a real eye-opener in what it takes to get to the next level.''
''I've had camps in the past, but none anywhere near as serious as this.''
Tysoe does five or six training sessions per week, not many by swimming standards, but still managed a third place finish in the 200m backstroke at the National Age Championships.
''One of my attributes I guess is the fact I don't train as much - I haven't hit the gym yet or anything like that, so when I found out I was just on the shortlist for [this camp] I was stoked actually.''
After a week of testing in the gym, in the water, and with the biomechanic measurements only available at the AIS, each swimmer came away knowing where they needed to improve.
''I need to focus on lengthening my stroke in backstroke,'' Tysoe said.
The next carnival starts today, with the State Teams Short Course Championships at the AIS.