Valerie Lloyd-Chandos

In 1947, Valerie Lloyd-Chandos won the Southern Counties junior springboard title at the age of 14 and was reckoned to be the best young diving prospect since Betty Slade 12 years earlier. At the time, Lloyd-Chandos was coached by Jack Beasley, who was the Great Britain Olympic coach. In addition, she practiced diving at home and perfected the art of diving safely into a sand pit her father at constructed in the garden of their family home in Teddington.

All the dedication and hard work paid off for the Twickenham Grammar School scholar because Lloyd-Chandos finished third in the 3m springboard at the 1949 ASA championships and was runner-up to Dorothy Drew in the Southern Counties championships. The following year Lloyd-Chandos lost by 0.60 points to Kay Cuthbert for the national ASA 1m title and at New Brighton in 1950 was runner-up again to Cuthbert in the 1m, and was third in both the 3m springboard and platform events.

Lloyd-Chandos won back-to-back Southern Counties 3m titles in 1951 and 1952 and won the platform title in the second of those years. Also in 1952, she was third in the 1m and second in the platform event at the ASA Championships at Wallasey. Olympic selection followed and at Helsinki she competed in the platform competition and finished 12th

Lloyd-Chandos was a civil servant and often competed in the Civil Service Swimming and Diving Championships. For hobbies she enjoyed horse riding, reading, and architecture. Lloyd-Chandos endured tragedy in 1959 when her older Sister Vera and her husband accidentally died from gas poisoning while on holiday in a villa at Vale de Gatos, near Lisbon, Portugal. Their two children aged three and four were orphaned as a result of the accident.