CLAIRE Cashmore may be facing competition from Britain’s young emerging swimmers but she insists she is well equipped to deal with the pressure heading into Rio 2016.

The 27-year-old came away with three medals from last week’s IPC World Championships in Glasgow, winning silver in the 100m breaststroke before teaming up for gold and bronze in the 4x100m medley relay and 4x100m freestyle relay respectively.

It maintained her record of medalling at every World Championships she has entered since 2006 and showed she is still more than a match for anyone in the pool Three years ago Cashmore won double silver and a bronze at London 2012, taking her tally of Paralympic medals to six in total.

With Rio ticking ever closer, it promises to be a tight battle for places – Great Britain finishing fifth in the medal table at the recent Worlds, with 32 podium finishes in total.

And Cashmore, who slept in a special altitude tent as part of her Worlds preparations, believes keeping a cool head will be key.

“The World Championships is definitely a stepping stone towards Rio. It is a great competition because a year before the Paralympics, suddenly people come out of nowhere and everyone who you haven’t seen compete for years come up – the Chinese don’t appear very often but a year before they produce a great team so it is great to see what the competition is like out there.

“It is great to race your rivals because you can never race them too much.

“My first goal is to make the team for Rio. It is getting tougher and tougher to make the team and there are younger swimmers chasing your feet so the first step is to make the team and then I want to enjoy myself and be the best I can be.

“You don’t gain from putting too much pressure on yourself because you cannot completely control what medal you win.

“The only thing you can control is being the best that you can be. As long as I put in a lifetime best performance and enjoy it, then that will be the main thing.”

Cashmore has little time to catch her breath after Glasgow with her next outing coming this Sunday at London’s Aquatics Centre as part of the National Paralympic Day celebrations.

Designed to help continue the legacy of the 2012 Games, the annual event will feature both elite athletics and swimming as well as promoting disability sport.

And Cashmore admits she can’t wait to relieve memories of her London success while also hoping to inspire more people to get involved.

“I think National Paralympic Day is really important in carrying on the legacy of the Paralympic Games,” she added.

“I had people coming up to me after London after me ‘how can I be super human like you?’ They had all their arms and legs but they wanted to be disabled.

“Having it back where it started in the London pool will be fantastic, I loved it last year and I can’t wait to race there again.

“Hopefully we can inspire a generation and make people realise that even though they have a disability, they can achieve big things.”

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