BETWEEN the home Games of 1986 (Edinburgh) and 2002 (Manchester), only two Commonwealth medals were won by Scottish swimmers, one each by Fraser Walker and Alison Sheppard.
Since the end of that famine there has been a plentiful harvest: 23 medals, 20 of them won by individuals and nine of them gold.
Sportscotland's stated target for swimming is to win five medals at Glasgow 2014. If this seems a modest goal, it takes into account that the haul of 12 at Melbourne 2006 was in some ways a freak occurrence. It also recognises that, unlike other Games venues, Tollcross Park this week has become a priority destination for scores of athletes who are world leaders in their events.
The 400 metres freestyle, in which Robbie Renwick, Stephen Milne and Daniel Wallace take part today, will be the crowd's first introduction to the VIP aquatics guest list of Glasgow 2014. Renwick is ranked 15th in the world this year. In Glasgow, Australia will be represented by David McKeon (No.1), Mack Horton (No.4) and Jordan Harrison (No.7) while James Guy (No.6) of England, Ryan Cochrane (No.8) of Canada and New Zealand's Matthew Stanley (No.12) have all swum faster than the Tollcross-based Aberdonian.
You can have all the home advantage you like, and remain umbilically attached to your training goals, but, as Ally Whike pointed out yesterday, if the guy in the next lane is faster there is not a great deal that can be done.
"The Commonwealth Games are obviously very important to Scotland's swimmers - it's the only time they get to swim under the Scottish flag - but you have to keep in mind the perspective that the World Championships and Olympics are right up there in terms of quality," said Whike, who has been Scottish Swimming's performance director since 2006. "Having said that, the Games do attract a high level of swimmer and a lot of the world's best are in Glasgow."
Renwick, who will be defending his 200m title tomorrow, and then competing in a slew of relays, is unlikely to be hailed as the home hero on day one. The recipients of that honour will be Michael Jamieson and/or Hannah Miley.
Jamieson is, from all conceivable angles, the man to catch. He has swum a world-leading 2mins 07.79secs this year, which is eight-tenths of a second short of the Holy Grail. He is a stubborn man who has broken the world record once before, in London two years ago, only to find that another man, Daniel Gyurta, had also broken it in the same race and that it was the Hungarian who touched the wall first.
Two days ago Jamieson asked Gregor Tait, the double champion of 2006, if he could get him one of those little desk fans for his room in the Games Village, because it was so hot he could not sleep. The Glaswegian is leaving nothing to chance.
"Michael was a late developer, but we have created an environment where late developers can thrive," said Whike. "Kris Gilchrist was a late developer and so was Ross Murdoch."
Murdoch lines up alongside Jamieson today but his real chance lies in the shorter sprints.
Miley should only have one rival to worry about on day one. It is hard, given China's non-involvement in the Commonwealth Games, to imagine a swimmer in the 400m individual medley shaving numerous seconds off her personal best to beat the doyenne of Scottish swimming, a winner of European and world titles as well as the gold medallist at in Delhi four years ago.
No, her only threat to gold should be Aimee Willmott, her rapidly-improving rival from Middlesbrough who, at 21, is four years younger than Miley and only half a second slower on current form.
For Whike, who is rightly determined to dwell on times rather than finishing positions, as times are the only sure indicator of progress, the problem is how to replace Miley when she eventually hangs up her goggles, probably after Rio 2016, with Caitlin McClatchey now acknowledged as a swimmer who competes for the love of it and views medals as a bonus.
"On the girls' side, we need to do a little bit more work," he said. "There are some good young athletes there who can do well, but we don't currently have the depth that we have with the men."
There are more sophisticated ways to achieve that than throwing babies in at the deep end, but their experience in the rarefied waters of Tollcross this week can only do them more good than harm.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article