
The dozen swimmers, divers, water polo players and one member of the synchronised swimming squad got together for this exclusive — and daring — photo-shoot.

Diver Tonia Couch, 21, from Plymouth, the same town as Britain’s top medal hope, schoolboy diver Tom Daley, admitted her boyfriend had his doubts about it.

‘When I told him what we were doing, he said: “What? Naked?”’

Naked ambition: A dozen of Great Britain's Olympic hopefuls took to the pool... naked



1 Monique Gladding, 29, from Sheffield: 10 metre high board, individual and synchronised



2 Sophie Casson, 25, from Hest Bank, Lancashire: 10km open water swim



3 Stephanie Millward, 29, from Swansea: Paralympic swimming

4 Brooke Graddon, 23, from Plymouth: 10 metre high board diving



5 Stacey Tadd, 21, from Bath: 200m breaststroke



6 Lisa Gibson, 21, from Manchester: Water polo (centre-forward)



7 Robyn Nichols, 20, Manchester: Water polo (goal)



8 Katie Dawkins, 22, from Bristol: Synchronised swimming



9 Rachel Lefley, 20, from Gainsborough: Short course swimming



10 Amy Smith, 23, from Kidderminster: Freestyle sprint swimming



11 Tonia Couch, 21, from Plymouth: 10m high board individual and synchronised

12 Georgia Davies, 20, from Swansea: Backstroke

Twenty-one-year-old Stacey Tadd, a 200 metres breaststroke swimmer from Bath, took along her mum for moral support.

Water polo player Lisa Gibson, 21, said: ‘I wasn’t nervous about being naked in front of the camera.

'I was more worried about how I was going to breathe and smile at the same time.’

Also in the picture is Stephanie Millward, a paralympic swimmer who has battled multiple sclerosis.

Two divers were on standby with oxygen masks as the girls posed for the Mail’s Andy Hooper, who used £10,000 worth of camera gear — a Nikon D300 encased in a watertight Subal housing.

Each girl had to be photographed individually because it would have been too chaotic to try to capture them all at once.

They were then ‘placed’ in a group by some computer wizardry.

The photo-shoot was carried out to back the girls’ Olympic dream, sponsored by the National Lottery and British Gas.

The Lottery is supporting more than 1,200 athletes for 2012, as well as contributing up to £2.2 billion to the Olympic venues.

Thanks to National Lottery players, over 1,200 athletes are benefitting from world-class support for 2012. The National Lottery is also contributing up to £2.2bn to the London 2012 venues, infrastructure and legacy. www.national-lottery.co.uk/bepartofit

For more information on British swimming, visit:

Wall-to-wall inspiration in Olympic Village

A line from Alfred Lord Tennyson's poem 'Ulysses' will be engraved on a wall in the Olympic Village to inspire athletes competing in the 2012 London Games.

The last line of the poem - 'To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield' - was selected by a panel that included Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duff and author Sebastian Faulks.