Club Championships

On Saturday 19th November, the Annual Club Championships were held at Strode with 102 swimmers achieving 298 personal best times and 7 swimmers set new Championship Best Times (CBT) in 17 events.

Competition was at times incredibly close and not only determined who were the fastest swimmers in each age group, but provided the opportunity to compete in events that they may not normally swim for the club. The proceedings were started by announcing the Junior and Senior Club Captains. Junior Captains for 2005/2006 are Chelsie Kirman and Ryan Neath and Senior Captains are Lisa Hutchinson and David Stewart.

The CBT’s began to fall in the second event of the day, the Men’s Open 100m Breaststroke, with David Stewart bettering his previous record, which had stood for 9 years, by over two seconds with a time of 1:14.31.

This was swiftly followed in the first session, in the girl’s 13 years 100m freestlye, with Ellena Ibal setting the first of her 3 CBT’s, demonstrating the great improvement’s she has shown over the last year. Her new mark for the 100m Freestyle was 1:07.97, nearly a second quicker than Kate Bray’s 1994 record, and was followed later in the session in the 100m Individual Medley with a time of 1:18.18. This beat Holly Burlon’s 2000 record by over a second. The first part of the evening session also saw her set another best in the 100m Backstroke with 1:17.85, reducing Kate Bray’s 1994 record by six tenths of a second.

Megan Prideaux quickly followed, with her first of two CBT’s in the girl’s 14 years 100m freestyle, with a new time of 1:06.56, nearly one and a half seconds quicker than Charlotte George’s 1998 record. She then went on to better Hiolly Burlton’s 2001 CBT by nearly 4 seconds in the 100m Backstroke with 1:16.44. Both of these times were quicker than all other 100m Freestyle and Backstroke CBT’s, so more can be expected in the 15 years age group next year.

Stephen Bowen set CBT’s in all five of the boy’s 15 years age group events, starting with the 100m freestlye, becoming only the fifth swimmer in the club to break the 60-second barrier with 59.72, beating James Rodger’s 2004 mark by over 4 seconds (1:04.15). He then continued to make substantial reductions to the CBT’s for the remaining events with 1:17.66 for the 100m Breaststroke (1:23.00, Andrew Edwards 1995), 1:08.91 for the 100m Individual Medley (1:14.39, Simon Bryant, 1998), 1:10.50 for the 100m Backstroke (1:14.74, Andrew Edwards, 1995), finishing with 1:09.85 for the 100m Butterfly (1:12.65, James Rodgers 2004). All of these swims, with the exception of the Breaststroke, were the fastest of the day and the 100m Butterfly swim was very nearly a second quicker than the CBT in the Open Age Group. He was also the first swimmer in a number of years to set CBT’s in every event in an age group. In all he made a combined reduction to CBT’s of 22.29 seconds!

Pushing Stephen very closely in the Freestyle, Breaststroke and IM swims was Gary Carpenter, who also swam quicker than the previous CBT in those events. Also, had he repeated his performance in the Open 100m Breaststroke (1:17.18), he would have had a CBT for his age group.

Closing the opening session, Sophie Feboul set the first of two CBT’s in the girl’s 12 years age group with 1:19.59 for the 100m IM, beating Hollie Ellis’ 12 year record by a second. She continued, in the evening, with a new record for the 50m Butterfly with 35.43, beating her sister, Alison’s record from last year by nearly a second.

Harry Thornton set the first of his three CBT’s in the second part of the afternoon session in the 12 years 100m Breaststroke, setting a new record of 1:28.40, beating Ben Trudgian’s 1997 record by over two seconds (1:30.82). He followed this later in the session with a new record of 1:21.35 for the 100 IM, also beating Ben Trudgians mark of 1:24.10. He closed his account in the evening with 1:22.90 for the 100m Backstroke, beating Luke Whittaker’s 1998 time of 1:23.82.

The final, swimmer to set a CBT was Jenni Gilbert, who surprised herself as much as anyone else, setting a new record of 1:24.40 for the girls 14 years 100m Butterfly. She reduced Louise Harris’ record by just 3 hundredths of a second. Her services as a Butterfly swimmer had not been called on a great deal whilst competing for the club, but this is bound to change, highlighting the importance of all swimmers swimming all events at the Club Championships.

As well as the swimmers performing to their best, there was a tremendous effort from all the people that worked behind the scenes and on the day to ensure that once again this was a very successful Club Championship event.

For further results and age group results, please click here

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