Three Olympic medallists. One pool. Same morning lane different flags come Glasgow. Inside the friendship, rivalry, and marginal-gains science driving Scott, Dean and McMillan into a home Commonwealth Games.
The Fastest Lane in Britain: Inside Stirling's Commonwealth Freestyle Powerhouse
There is a lane at the University of Stirling swimming pool that, on any given training morning, contains more Olympic gold medals than most nations will ever produce. Duncan Scott. Tom Dean. Jack McMillan. Three of the fastest freestyle swimmers in Great Britain, sharing a pool in the Scottish Highlands, each preparing to race each other at a Commonwealth Games that will be held quite literally up the road.
Glasgow 2026 is not just another competition for this trio. It is a homecoming, a convergence, and for some, a chance to rewrite the narrative of a disrupted few years. Dean arrived from Bath just seven months ago, making one of the most significant moves of his career. McMillan, representing Northern Ireland, has been quietly building towards the kind of season that turns heads. And Scott who has been at Stirling for over a decade is preparing for what could be his second home Commonwealth Games, a prospect he describes simply as wanting to "soak it up."
That these three men share a pool at all is both entirely logical and mildly remarkable. They are GB relay teammates who will compete for different home nations in the individual events. They are rivals who have pushed each other in some of the closest freestyle finishes British swimming has produced in recent years. And they are, by their own account, genuine friends. Understanding how that combination works inside the pool and out is to understand something important about what elite training culture can look like when it gets the balance right.
A New Arrival, a Decade-Long Anchor, and a Man Rising
The dynamics of the Stirling freestyle group this season are shaped in large part by the arrival of Tom Dean. The Olympic champion from Tokyo, who edged Scott by 0.04 seconds in one of the most celebrated finishes in British swimming history, relocated from Bath to Stirling in September 2025. It was a bold move seven years at one programme, under a coach he describes as "like a third parent," and then a deliberate decision to seek out something different.
Dean is candid about the complexity of that transition. "I moved away from family, friends, a training environment that I'm comfortable and know really well," he says. "I wanted to have a bit of a shakeup to make sure that swimming can be the best it can possibly be." The move carried risk. And then, before he had the chance to show what the new programme was building towards, a shoulder injury knocked him off the path he had mapped out for himself.
Missing British Trials hurt. Dean had not missed a British Championships since he first started going to them in 2014 and 2015. "Having an injury that knocks you off the path you thought you were going to be staying on is really quite tough," he says. "I've done a long block of work at a new training centre, really committed myself, and the end product I wasn't able to do the exciting, fun, sharp bit and really show what I've been working on." There were moments, he admits, when everything felt uncertain. Not just the injury, but what it meant for the decisions that had led him here.
What steadied him was his relationship with coach Ben, who framed Dean's journey back from injury not as a derailment but as something unique a path that would serve him well by the time the Games came around and, beyond that, as he looks towards Los Angeles 2028. "He's been extremely supportive, especially through times of injury," Dean says. The shoulder has improved. The trajectory is upward. And crucially, the competitions are coming Geneva, Barcelona, and a further lead-in meet before Glasgow each one approached with a deliberate tactical framework rather than simply treated as a box to tick.
Scott, meanwhile, has been at Stirling long enough to have seen multiple generations of athletes come through the programme. Now 29 and on the cusp of his fourth Commonwealth Games, he occupies the role of the established anchor of the group the one who sets the standard day in and day out, who has already navigated the peaks and valleys that Dean and McMillan are still encountering for the first time, and who brings a kind of institutional knowledge that is as valuable in training as any split time.
McMillan's trajectory is different again. Representing Northern Ireland and now ranked among the top four 200m freestyle swimmers in Britain, he has been steadily climbing towards a breakthrough season. "I've gotten better as I've got older," he says. "I had a bit of a plateau, but then I came out of that and I'm getting a lot faster each year." He speaks with a clarity about his own development that suggests someone who has processed his journey carefully who knows what it cost to keep going when it would have been easier not to, and who is motivated by what that persistence has made possible.
Inside the Pool: Where the Real Work Happens
The training itself at Stirling is built on the Jan Olbrick system a philosophy that is, by the standards of elite competitive swimming, deliberately unconventional. It prioritises specificity over sheer volume, longevity over short-term output, and technical precision over brute accumulation of metres. Scott, who has been training under this model for a decade, is its most public advocate. "It's probably a training setup that lends itself more to longevity," Dean says, still in the early stages of exploring it himself. "That's been a real big change for me, and I've enjoyed exploring a whole new approach.
Within sessions, the work is granular. Underwater video analysis using camera systems that capture what no poolside eye can see is central to how all three athletes understand and refine their technique. The cameras reveal the gap between what a swimmer feels and what is happening in the water, a gap that, at this level of competition, can be the difference between a final and a podium. "You can be feeling something and then a video shows you're not doing that at all," Scott explains. "Or vice versa. The camera doesn't lie."
Force pad analysis is another tool that has become part of Scott's preparation this season, used to fine-tune the catch mechanics in butterfly and breaststroke marginal gains work of a kind that only makes sense at the very top of the sport. The data, he says, allows the coaching team to identify inefficiencies that would otherwise remain invisible. "It's all about marginal gains," he says. "Being able to break down your swim into numbers can be really helpful you can see where there are glaringly obvious things to do with efficiency, counts, rates, all of that."
For Dean, one of the most striking things about the Stirling programme has been the integration of the sports science operation specifically, the way that different support teams communicate with each other rather than operating in isolation. He describes a biomarkers project, running in partnership with Scottish Institute of Sport and British Swimming, that tracks training load in extraordinary detail: metres and intensities in the pool, gym loads, RPE scores from sessions, sleep quality, heart rate variability, resting heart rates, regular blood tests, body composition measurements. "What I found this season more than ever before is how all the various areas of sports science are actually talking to each other much more than they used to," he says. During his shoulder rehabilitation, that integration became particularly important the physio team, the strength and conditioning staff, the coaching team, and the intensive rehabilitation unit at Bisham were all in communication, mapping out a return-to-training plan with no gaps. "It's completely watertight," Dean says.
McMillan's emphasis in preparation has been on trusting that system. "There's so much data behind my swimming," he says, in a phrase that could serve as a motto for the entire programme. "That gives me the confidence mentally that what I'm doing in the pool is going to work." It is a point worth dwelling on for an elite athlete heading into a major game, uncertainty is the enemy. Data, properly gathered and communicated, replaces uncertainty with evidence. It gives you something to lean on when the pressure builds.
The Gym, the Physio, and the Infrastructure That Keeps Them Going
The pool is only part of the picture. Elite swimming preparation at this level is built on a network of support systems that runs from the gym to the physio room to the psychologist's office, and what distinguishes Stirling as both Scott and Dean are quick to note is that all of it is in one place.
Dean, who knows Bath well from seven years there, can compare directly. "Both are actually extremely similar," he says. "Olympic-sized pools, good underwater camera systems, gym setups that have everything we need, physio on hand." The key difference, he suggests, is not the quality of the facilities but the integration the fact that at Stirling, you are constantly in an environment of high performance across multiple sports. "You're not in an isolated pool with a gym that's separate to it," he says. "You're in a sports centre that's home to loads of different sports. It keeps you in a high-performance mindset." He has already begun picking up connections with curling and golf athletes on campus the kind of cross-sport relationship that enriches an athlete's world beyond the tunnel-vision of their own discipline.
The gym work is non-negotiable. McMillan names his strength and conditioning coach as one of the two most important relationships in his daily life at the programme alongside his swimming coach, the S&C coach is someone he sees constantly, who tracks his physical development across the season and whose input feeds directly into how sessions in the pool are structured and sequenced. "Having that routine is a really important one for mental health," McMillan says. The week planned out, the planner sent, the accountability established it creates a structure that allows focus to settle where it needs to.
Scott's primary off pool concerns this season has been consistency, something that is complicated by an immune disorder that he manages carefully with the programme's medical team. "My immunity is like a chocolate teapot," he says with characteristic self-deprecating humour. The relationship with the doctor at Stirling is one of the most important in his daily life, precisely because staying healthy is what makes everything else possible. "How do we stay consistent?" he says. "That's the main thing." The physio team, meanwhile, has long since become part of his standard preparation the pre- and post-pool routines he developed years ago following a shoulder injury of his own have kept that injury from ever returning. "They not only sorted you out but educated you on how to avoid it again," he says. "That education has been really, really useful."
Dean's physio relationship this season has been more intensive and more urgent. The shoulder rehabilitation required physio, strength and conditioning, coaching staff and the Bisham rehab unit to work in concert a genuinely multidisciplinary approach that, Dean suggests, he has not experienced at this level of integration before. "All these various areas have allowed me to get back to the point where my shoulder's healthy again," he says. He frames it not just as recovery but as education: understanding what the issue was, and building a plan to ensure it does not recur as the programme extends towards LA.
Training as Rivals, Competing as Friends
The most distinctive feature of the Stirling freestyle group this season the thing that makes it different from almost any training environment in British swimming history is the presence of three athletes who will race each other for different nations at the Commonwealth Games, and who do so while training together every morning.
It could be uncomfortable. In practice, it appears to be the opposite.
Dean describes the culture that coaches Ben and Brad have built as "really healthy," and he is specific about why. "At the end of the day, we have lads from England, Scotland, Northern Ireland for the Commonwealth Games, we were all going to be going head-to-head with each other. But we'll also have lads who want to be on the 4 by 200 freestyle relay together at the World Champs and Olympics in 2027 and 2028, but who also want to get those top two spots for individual swims at the 200." The tension between those two things competes against each other, collaborate with each other is, he says, what keeps the standard high. "It keeps everyone strict. It holds you to a high standard."
For McMillan, the dynamic is straightforwardly motivating. "We're really good friends to begin with, so that helps a lot," he says. "We're direct competitors, but we have enough friendly banter in training and that friendship outside the pool helps a lot." The practical effect of training alongside Scott and Dean every day is that he cannot afford complacency. "If you're beating them, or if you're doing things better than them, that gives you a really good confidence boost but if you slack at any point, you know that they're just going to beat you. So, it puts you on a higher pedestal to perform every day." He frames it explicitly as a reason to get out of bed in the morning. "If I'm not getting out of bed and Duncan goes to training well, he's probably going to beat me."
Scott's perspective on Dean's arrival is honest about the complexity. "I was probably a little bit apprehensive when he decided to join," he admits. Part of that, he suggests without dwelling on it, is the specific baggage that comes with training alongside someone who beat you by 0.04 seconds in an Olympic final. "That was an unbelievable swim from him," Scott says simply. But the apprehension gave way to something more useful: the recognition that training with the best makes you better. "For me to be as good as I can be, I need to train with really good people." And he adds something revealing about Dean specifically: "One thing I found really helpful is just seeing how diligent he is on some of what might be seen as the boring parts of training. The skill work, the drill work, the easy metres even having done it the same way for 10 years, his commitment to those small details is something I've taken learnings from."
That mutual elevation Dean learning from Scott's consistency, Scott being pushed by Dean's arrival is the engine of the group. McMillan noted specifically that seeing elite athletes navigating the difficult days, the poor sessions, the races that do not go to plan, is itself an education. "Everyone can swim really well when things are going smoothly," he says. "How do you deal with the highs and how do you deal with the lows? That's the most important part of the journey." Watching Scott handle those moments the composure, the perspective, the ability to reset has been, for McMillan, as valuable as any session in the pool.
The Mental Game: Three Philosophies, One Goal
As Glasgow approaches, each athlete brings a different psychological toolset to bear on the challenge of performing at a major game.
Dean has rebuilt his mental confidence around two things: the depth of his coaching relationship with Ben, and a deliberate shift towards pragmatic, tactical race-planning rather than simply chasing times on a board. He is clear-eyed about the fact that his journey into these games has not been linear. "It's been some unexpected curveballs," he says. "But everything's been a learning curve this year since moving up here. Not a normal run into Commies, but it's very rare that you'll get a completely clean run in anyway." The longer-term vision of LA 2028 provides an important counterweight to the disappointments of 2025 it means no single result carries existential weight.
Scott operates from a position of experience that is both a resource and, occasionally, a pressure. He will go into Glasgow carrying the label of most decorated Scottish Commonwealth Games swimmer, the weight of a home crowd's expectation, and the knowledge that his own standards for himself exceed anything the public expects. "The expectations I have for myself are far greater than what other people think," he says simply. His relationship with the mental side of competition is built on transparency with the people around him coaches, support staff, the doctor he has known for over a decade rather than formal psychological support. "I've been here for over 10 years," he says. "The relationship I've built with all those support staff members is quite a transparent one." He speaks about approaching Glasgow with a desire to be fearless, to enjoy the competition, and to simply be hard to beat. "If I don't give up on anything, and I go close to my best times, I know I've got a good shot."
McMillan has found his mental equilibrium in routine and process. He describes the act of trusting the training knowing that if the work has been done correctly, the performance will follow as the foundation of his competitive confidence. "It doesn't matter if it's the Commonwealth Games or the Olympics or a competition locally," he says. "It's the same pool, same water, you've got your own lane. There's only so much that can go wrong." He controls what is controllable and lets the rest go. The experience of watching Scott and Dean in training, day after day, manage the ordinary difficulties of elite athletic life the bad sessions, the setbacks, the moments where everything feels harder than it should has been its own kind of preparation for the competition ahead. "You need those setbacks to actually learn from them," McMillan says. "If you can get that piece right, I don't see why you can't swim for really long careers."
Glasgow: Where It All Comes Together
The 200 metres freestyle final at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games will, if the field takes shape as expected, contain three men who have spent this season sharing a pool, a gym, and a support team. They will race for Scotland, England and Northern Ireland respectively. One of them will win. All three will bring something to the starting blocks that has been quietly forged in the lanes of a pool on the banks of a Scottish loch over the course of a long and demanding season.
For Scott, who has experienced a home Commonwealth Games before, the opportunity is to be present in a way that experience makes possible. "Most people only get to do one, or none, home competitions," he says. "I want to be grateful. Just soak it up the atmosphere, the environment, the team, everything like that." He will also, quietly, be watching the younger athletes in the squad find their feet at a major game for the first time, offering guidance where it is sought and leading, mostly, by example. "Leadership comes in many forms," he says. "If I just go about my day-to-day business and do what I do every day, that could be the example they need to see."
Dean arrives in Glasgow with something to prove not in a desperate sense, but in the quieter, more purposeful sense of an athlete who has been building through disruption and wants to demonstrate what that building has been worth. Glasgow is not the end of his story. It is a chapter. "Not a normal run in," he says of his preparation. "But everywhere I've been, every set I've done, it's been pointing towards this."
McMillan, perhaps, carries the simplest clarity of the three. He has been getting faster year on year, he is in the best group in British freestyle swimming, and the 200 metres final at a home games are the kind of race he has been preparing his whole career to compete in. "You just don't know what's around the corner," he says. "Or what kind of trajectory you might end up going on."
In Stirling, in a pool on a campus with a lake at its centre, three men who are rivals, teammates and friends have been finding out. Glasgow will be where the rest of the world catches up.