It was a measure of how important the 'C' Final of the Speedo league was, on Saturday 10th December, that Rachel Aldington, Clevedon squad coach, came out of retirement to swim for the team. The 'old lady' of 25 years swam in the 100m Breaststroke and in the Freestyle relay in the Open age group and not only came second in the Breaststroke but achieved a Personal Best time!

It was the first Speedo League Gala to be held at Strode for over 10 years and lived up to its promise to be one of the most tense and competitive galas ever seen in the pool. Clevedon knew that they had to win the gala to be sure of staying in the second division for another season, after promotion last year. No other result would guarantee safety. From the first beep in the first race, a neck and neck battle developed between Clevedon and Exmouth, the lead changing hands on several occasions. As the evening progressed Clevedon started to pull away and opened up an 8 point lead on the field. Then with about 15 races to go, an impressive Cirencester team started to win what seemed like every race. The result came down to the very last race of the evening and our Men's Open relay team needed to beat Cirencester in their race to clinch the first place and guarantee 2nd division survival. They duly delivered against a background barrage of noise that threatened to shatter the pool windows not to mention the eardrums of the spectators.

Final Positions were:
1st Clevedon 179 points
2nd Cirencester 177 points
3rd Exmouth 169 points
4th Paignton 120 points
5th Christchurch 102 points

There were PB's from : Rachel Aldington, Megan Prideaux, Ellena Ibal, Nick Flower, Stephen Bowen, Harry Thornton, Liam Wakefield and Tom Jones. We won 12 first places - 8 individual and 4 relays. As always with a home gala, the organisation was impeccable and the team captains did a marvellous job in motivating the squad to victory.
The club’s impressive performance to win this final round gala elevated them from 17th to 13th out of 18 teams in the final table, missing relegation by two places. For results from all three rounds, the final league table and further information on the Speedo League, please refer to the Speedo League website on the Links Page.

Graham Feboul/DJS Webmaster