The marketing manager trying to match father's world record

Have you ever wondered how you'd fare going up against the world's best?

Badly, would be the answer for most of us.

But what if the person you're challenging is your father - the one who passed on his genes? Even if you are a marketing manager rather than a professional swimmer, that has to count for something, right?

"The closest I get to any kind of sport at work is a standing desk," says 33-year-old Adam Wilkie.

"This is going to be entirely different."

Those who recognise the surname may remember David Wilkie as one of the most iconic British Olympians of his era.

With his bushy moustache and long hair hidden by a swimming cap, he won 200m breaststroke gold at the Montreal Olympics in 1976.

Adam has given himself a year to try and match his dad's time - a world record at the time - 50 years on, doing so for charity and in memory of David, who died from cancer in 2024.

"He would think I am mad because he knows how hard it was," Adam says. "He knows how hard swimming is and how much work he put in to get to that time.

"But I think he would be proud that his son is trying to do something to remember him."

Image caption,

American Mark Spitz (right) and Wilkie were two of the iconic swimmers of the 1970s. Wilkie's gold made him the first British man to win Olympic gold in the pool in 68 years

The time in question is two minutes 15.11 seconds.

Though the record has been lowered by about 10 seconds since, such a mark still would have made the top five at last year's British Championships.

Adam has given up his job and is going to train full-time with a professional coach. He will have access to facilities and sport science on offer at Aquatics GB, but he has never been an elite swimmer.

He was even scared of the deep end of the pool as a child.

"I'm going to be getting up to six, seven, eight sessions of swimming a week," says Adam, who will begin the challenge in earnest by setting an initial time at the Aquatics GB Swimming Championships this weekend.

"It's going to be all-encompassing. It's going to be the hardest thing I've ever done.

"It's going to be incredibly painful at points and there'll be moments where I'll sit on the side of a pool being like: 'Why the hell did I decide to do this?'

"But I'm trying to pay homage to my father, keep his memory alive in my own mind and test myself.

"I'm testing myself against the yardstick of the greatest man I knew, who was my dad."

Reaching his father's time will be hugely challenging - some might say impossible.

"Most people who know swimming will be like, 'he has no chance'," Adam says. "But I want to try."

But Adam says the 12 months ahead are about more than strokes, leg kicks, minutes and seconds.

Having not swam seriously since he was 18, he only got back into the sport after his father's death to "feel connected to him" as he grieved.

Adam hopes to travel to some of the pools his father swam in, including in Sri Lanka - where David was born to Scottish parents, in Scotland itself, Miami and even Montreal.

He will also raise money for Sports Aid, who help support youngsters with the expense that come with chasing sporting dreams, and take advice from his dad's former team-mates.

"Doing this challenge has allowed me to go back through his life," Adam says.

"My dad retired at 22, long before I came along, so it's a part of his life that I didn't necessarily know that much about.

"I'm hoping I've got a lot of his swimming genes, so we'll see as the year unfolds.

"I want this story to demonstrate how amazing swimmers are, how hard this sport is and how much effort, time and work these guys and girls put in to get to where they are.

"And I want to demonstrate how good my dad was."