Ten Team GB debutants set to shine at Paris 2024

Paris 2024 15 Jul 24

The Olympic Games has power like no other.

It can turn an athlete into a generational star and a national hero in just a matter of seconds.

From Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill and Sir Steve Redgrave to Harold Abrahams and Rebecca Adlington, the Olympic Games are the making of sporting stars.

With Paris 2024 around the corner, here are 10 Olympic debutants who are ready to make a name for themselves in the French captial.

Louie Hinchliffe (Athletics - 100m)

Louie Hinchliffe's rise to the top has been as express as his speed on the track.

Just 10 months on from reaching out to nine-time Olympic champion Carl Lewis, for some sprinting tips, Hinchliffe has been crowned British champion and made track history.

The 21-year-old moved to the United States for college in Houston and became the first European to win the prestigious NCAA title over 100m this summer.

He ran 9.95 seconds in the process, a first legal sub-10 seconds time, and with coach Lewis, he clinched a spot in Paris by claiming the men’s 100m title at the UK Athletics Championships.

Emma Finucane (Track cycling - women's sprint)

Emma Finucane might be just 21 years old in Paris but arrives with world and European gold to her name.

The track cycling star became the first British women's sprint world champion in a decade when she won gold in Glasgow last year, whilst flying through 200m sprint qualifying to set a new sea level world record time of 10.234s.

She followed that up with European gold in 2024, the first British woman to achieve the feat, and will now have eyes on completing the set in Paris.

Read more: Who is Emma Finucane

Micky Beckett (Sailing - ILCA 7)

Three years on from working in TV production at the Olympic Games in Tokyo, Micky Beckett will be representing Team GB in Paris.

The Welsh ICLA 7 sailor advised TV directors on race narratives and which areas to focus on after missing out on selection, but he’ll be in the hunt for gold this time round.

Beckett has been a lifelong sailing fanatic, riding the high seas on his father’s handmade vessel before racing for the first time aged nine.

He became a European champion in 2021 and claimed a Trofeo Princesa Sofia regatta hat-trick en route to becoming the number-one ranked ILCA 7 sailor in the world.

Luke Whitehouse (Artistic Gymnastics)

Luke Whitehouse is one of Britain’s newest and brightest gymnasts.

Winning back-to-back European titles since his major debut in 2023, the Halifax-born star has proved that he is a force to be reckoned with on the floor.

Add that to helping Britain to European team bronze at the 2023 event and Whitehouse is undoubtedly a breakout star.

Read more: Who is Luke Whitehouse

Kerenza Bryson (Modern Pentathlon)

Kerenza Bryson’s love for high pressure situations should make her ideally suited to the challenge at Paris 2024.

After the Games, Bryson will go to work in an NHS accident & emergency ward after she qualified as a doctor last year at the University of Plymouth. She has also trained as a Maritime Troop Commander Reserve Officer at Sandhurst.

She won World Championship silver in Bath in 2023 to earn Team GB a quota place before a fine run-up to her maiden Games with World Cup gold in Ankara in April and a European title just two weeks out from Paris 2024.

Toby Roberts (Sport Climbing - boulder and lead)

Climbing prodigy Toby Roberts’ fearlessness and creativity has taken him all the way to the Olympic Games.

His first recorded climb was at just three years old on a family day out and, aged 10, he became the youngest-ever Brit to scale Malham Cove.

His breakthrough year came in 2022, becoming the first British climber to win a Lead World Cup medal in 28 years.

Roberts cemented his rapid rise in the pre-Olympic year, making more history as the first man to qualify Team GB a climbing quota place with victory at the European Qualifiers in Laval.

Read more: Who is Toby Roberts

Oliver Morgan (Swimming - 100m and 200m backstroke)

Ollie Morgan didn't take swimming seriously until he was 18 years old, three years later and he's off to his maiden Olympics.

The University of Birmingham swimmer rocketed onto the swimming scene by winning the 50m, 100m and 200m backstroke triple at the 2023 National Championships before helping Britain to a 4x50m medley relay silver medal at the European Short Course Swimming Championships.

The backstroke specialist went on to break Liam Tancock's 15-year-old 100m British record at the Aquatics GB Swimming Championships to book his ticket to a maiden Games in Paris - clocking a new time of 52.70.

Ben Pattison (Athletics - 800m)

Ben Pattison overcame a heart condition to end Britain's 36-year-old men's 800m medal drought.

The Brit stormed to bronze at the 2023 World Championships, Britain’s first medal in the event since Peter Elliott in 1987, just three years after undergoing heart surgery for Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, a condition which caused his heart to beat up to 250 beats per minute in training.

Pattison stormed onto the scene with Commonwealth Games bronze in Birmingham, and just two weeks before Paris 2024, recorded Britain's second quickest men's 800m time ever behind Sebastian Coe with a time of 1:42.27.

Kieran Reilly (BMX Freestyle)

Kieran Reilly arrives at Paris 2024 to add Olympic gold to the world title he won last year.

The Gateshead rider crowned his rapid ascent to the top of Freestyle BMX by becoming world champion in Glasgow in 2023, following on from the European Games gold he won in 2022.

Reilly put the world on notice by becoming the first rider to land a ‘Triple Flair’ at the start of 2022 and has gone from strength to strength since then.

Read more: The making of... Kieran Reilly

Yasmin Harper (Diving - synchronised 3m springboard)

Yasmin Harper has nailed her journey to the top of British diving.

The City of Sheffield diver enjoyed great success at an early age before making the jump onto the senior stage with her first British title in 2022 and a maiden Commonwealth Games appearance.

Harper then stepped into a 3m springboard synchro pair with Scarlett Mew Jensen in 2023, filling in for an injury-stricken teammate, and the pair immediately rocketed to success by securing World Championship silver and a quota spot for Team GB at Paris.

The pair backed their 2023 performance up with bronze at the 2024 World Championships to perfectly set themselves up for this summer's Games.

Sportsbeat 2024

Tags