Ellie Challis hoping home comforts propel her to gold at World Para Swimming Championships

Swimming sensation Ellie Challis hopes familiar surroundings can spur her onto gold as she prepares for a whole host of firsts at her second Paralympic Games. Challis was Great Britain's youngest Paralympic medallist in Tokyo two years ago when she clinched silver in the women's S3 50m backstroke and has gone from strength to strength since, winning world gold in Madeira last year as well as bringing home a further four silvers from Atlantic archipelago. Ad Challis will look to defend that title and more in Manchester next month before turning her attention to the Paris 2024 Paralympics.

SwimmingFoster backing Peaty to clinch third Olympic title next summer despite breakAN HOUR AGO It is a city with which she is well acquainted thanks to regular trips to visit the company that manufacture meningitis vaccines, the disease that caused Challis to have a quadruple amputation before she was two years old, and the Clacton star believes she could gain an extra edge from competing in places she knows better than most over the next 12 months. «I feel very ready to race and I am very excited for it,» said Challis. «It is nice to be in Manchester and have my family be able to come.

»You don't get the excitement of travel, but my family gets to see me swim and that is more important to me. «Paris has kind of become a second home, my sponsor Sanofi is there, so I have had a couple of trips over there in the last year. To know I have that support in the country is nice.