Swimming sensation Sian Morgan is the first beneficiary of Bradford Council's and SportsAid's b active sports grants.

Sian, 13, of Ilkley, has been awarded £1,000 to help develop her skills in the run up to the 2012 Olympic Games in London.

Bradford Council and SportsAid Yorkshire and Humberside teamed up before Christmas to provide £20,000 of funding for athletes in the district who are identified as having the potential to go on to compete at a senior international level.

Sian has already won a host of titles and competitions and has now been fast-tracked into training with the Wales senior squad.

The Bradford Grammar School pupil is also one of a select group of 125 athletes that make up the 2012 Olympic training squad.

Sian is coached by Bradford Council's Andy Pearce and trains three mornings and five nights a week at Shipley and Rhodesway pools and Bradford Grammar School.

She swims for the City of Bradford Swimming Club, which is the competitive outlet of the Council's swimming development programme.

Sian won a silver medal in the 800 metre freestyle event and three bronze medals in the 100m, 200m and 400m at the season-ending National Age and Youth Championship at Sheffield's Ponds Forge last year.

Other career highlights to date include winning a silver and a bronze medal at the National Championships in 2006, a remarkable clean-sweep of 16 golds at the Yorkshire Championships in March 2007, and being selected to attend a training camp for British swimmers in Majorca in July last September.

Head of sport and leisure at Bradford Council, Steve Warner, said: "Sian is a tremendous talent but is also a terrific role model because her attitude and dedication to swimming is second to none.

"She has a very real possibility of competing in the 2012 Olympic Games in London."

The Bradford SportsAid b active awards are a follow-on from Bradford Council's b active awards, which recognise people in the district who through their outstanding achievements, encourage others to exercise and be more physically active.

They were introduced with the b active campaign, which was launched by the Sport and Leisure Service in 2003.