PORTLAND’S Jay Lelliott continued his remarkable year by securing a hat-trick of victories at the BUCS Short Course Championships, held at the Ponds Forge International Sports Centre in Sheffield.

Competing across a number of disciplines at the university-based meet, the former Torn-adoes of South Dorset youngster, pictured, blitzed the field in the 1,500m freestyle event to claim gold in a time of 14mins 58.67secs, 15 seconds ahead of the rest of the competition.

His success continued over the shorter distances by claiming third spot in the 200m freestyle on day two in a time of 1:46.66, just over a second slower than Cardiff’s Ieuan Lloyd.

Representing Bath University in the competition, Lelliott also took to the pool in the 200m freestyle relay and, alongside team-mates James Clark, Miles Munro and Warren Cannon, the quartet finished third behind Lough-borough University.

But on day three, the 19-year-old sealed an individual victory in the 400m freestyle, the event in which he won a European bronze medal in Berlin back in August.

Having finished fastest in qualifying, he then went on to complete his treble for the championships with a gold in the 200m butterfly final in a time of 1:56.14. Lelliott was also then thrust into the individual medley and sealed another bronze for the university.

Watching his son perform at the event, Steve Lelliott told Echosport: “It’s fantastic, he is in the middle of some quite hard training at the moment. He had the British long distance camp up at Loughborough last week so to perform like he has, I am over the moon.

“He has the Welsh nationals coming up so hopefully he will be in even better condition to swim even faster then.”