September 11th 2010 – North West Regional Development Day and Annual Council meeting.
Before the meeting I had received sheaves of paper from Di Stafford with information regarding the programme for the day and the protocol for the installation of the President. I was quite nervous.
I arrived at Leigh early and attended the ‘Time to Listen’ workshop which was very good. Keith Chisholm and Martin Tickner joined us for lunch which was followed by the Aquaforce presentations. We then moved onto the Annual Council Meeting. Half way through Keith and Martin proposed me for President (they said some very nice things for which I am very grateful) and I was accepted by the meeting. Pam Howarth the retiring President presented me with the Chain of Office and my first duty was to give her the Past Presidents Pin. I gave a very short speech thanking everybody and saying how much I was looking forward to my year in office.
Unfortunately I’m not making a very good start to the year as I am going to Australia for the month of October so have to miss the first three duties that I should be attending.
The first is the Regional Management Meeting on 28th September; I am still in the country but just can’t fit a meeting in at Leigh so close to going away.
The second is the Inter County Swimming Competition at Sheffield on the 16th October, and finally the ASA Council meeting on the 23/24th October. I believe the President-elect Roger Bowyer will be attending in my place.
So the first time I will be on duty is the North West Regional Championships on 6th/7th November in Manchester. Where I intend to work with the results team in the morning and make the presentations in the afternoon; I will be joined in the afternoons by my husband John who is acting as my ‘consort’, John isn’t really interested in swimming so we will see how we get on!
November 8th 2010
John and I
went to Manchester over the weekend for the NW Regional Winter
Championships; it was the first time John had been with me for any swimming
competition so I was interested to know what he would think of it all.
The
competition went smoothly, and in the afternoons John joined me on poolside to
watch the finals and to made the presentations. It was nice for me, in many
ways, because it meant that John saw what I have been doing for the last 25
years, and was able to meet a lot of the people that I work with.
He really
enjoyed it and was checking which swimmers had improved their times from heats
to finals, and was aware, by the end of the weekend which swimmers were repeat
medal winners. It was also pleasing for me to be able to present medals to
Cumbrian swimmers with Joe Elwood and Fraser Minnican from Ulverston and Jack
Barker from City of Carlisle winning medals. My biggest
difficulty during the presentations was reaching the swimmers to put the medals
round their necks, 6 foot tall swimmers are bad enough but once they were on
the podium, I didn’t stand a chance. Most of them were very good and bent down
for me, but Mark Mckenna from City of Manchester Aquatics, whom I have watched swim for the
last 10/15 years, during the last presentation thought it was quite amusing
just to stand there! He took pity on me in the end and bent down.
The swimming had been of a very high standard, and we had a very good weekend.
December 8th 2010
I’ve had the wonderful opportunity of seeing two more of the swimming disciplines in action recently.
On November 20th John and I travelled to Manchester Aquatic Centre to see a LEN European qualification Water Polo Match between Greece and GB. To be honest it is rather strange being asked if we are VIP’s and treated accordingly. We were taken through to the hospitality room where we were introduced to many of the top men in water polo, all of whom were very nice to us, but it is definitely a male dominated sport.
The match itself was one of contrasts - the ‘professional’ Greek team against the slightly less imposing GB team. I understand we are still playing catch up with the rest of Europe when it comes to Water Polo. The match is played over 4 quarters and the aim of the game is to get the ball in the opponents net to score a goal. It is the most contact ‘non’ contact sport I have ever seen, it is quite rough and we couldn’t even see what was going on under the water! Predictably Greece took the lead early on and by the end of the second half were 8 – 0 ahead. In the third quarter the GB team rallied and scored a couple of goals before Greece once again took control and scored 5 more. The end result being 13 – 2. We left the match no clearer in our understanding of the rules of the game, but it was a very enjoyable event anyway.
There were two really positive aspects of the game for me.
The first was that the ASA/Manchester had priced the tickets at £3 and there was a very good turn out, the balcony was almost full, and for anyone who attends swimming events in Manchester, you will know that there are usually approx 50 people there if we are lucky. As it was a National event there was a compere and they really tried to get an atmosphere going and to get the audience behind the team.
Secondly it was really nice for me to see Glen Robinson from Kendal playing for the GB team, I have known Glen since he was 10 years old when he first got into the County team to swim at the Inter Association event where I was team manager. I have followed his water polo career since he moved into that discipline when he was 15/16. Recently, his brother Mark, who is still with the Kendal team, told me that Glen had moved out to Hungary to play for a professional team to try and improve his skills. He had also said that Glen had acquired a severe shoulder injury so I wasn’t sure if he would be playing. At Manchester we were told that shoulder injuries are very common in Water Polo because of the extension and power they put into there catching and passes. So it was nice to see that Glen’s shoulder had improved and that we were able to watch a local boy wearing an International Hat.
Over the weekend of 4/5th December John and I have been to Gloucester to watch the British Gas National Age Group Synchronised Swimming Championships. We were very unsure whether we were going to be able to attend as the weather has been very poor recently with snow and ice abounding. However on Saturday morning it didn’t look to bad so we decided to go, fortunately once we left the A590 and got onto the Motorway the roads were fine. Having arrived at the pool we were made to feel very welcome by Anne Clarke and her ‘synchro’ team, everyone was wearing matching pink shirts, and they all looked very professional. Once again we were taken to the hospitality room where we were introduced to Don Neate the President of the ASA and Pat his wife. There were also 3 other Presidents from other regions and their wives, and David Fletcher from the ASA and his partner.
We were very privileged to be able to watch the current successful GB team in training and then to see a demonstration of their new routine which, will hopefully, take them through to more success in the European Swimming Championships in 2011. They have only been working on the routine for two weeks, and this was the first time they had performed it in public, we were astounded at the strength, grace and technical ability of these girls, it was awesome. We were also treated to an exhibition by Lauren Smith who won a Bronze Medal for Scotland in the Commonwealth games. The team are almost professionals; they are based in Aldershot, and use the army pool for their training. The pool needs to be 2/3m deep so that the under water work can be performed safely and without them touching the pool floor. When training the girls are allowed to wear hats and goggles but in competition they are not but nose clips are essential. The team is trained by a Canadian coach and she is assisted by an Italian Coach. Training has changed since they came onto the scene, and now a lot more time is spent doing fitness training with a speed swimming coach as well as the technical coaching these girls need. The girls need to be very very fit, their routine lasts 4/5 minutes, much of it completed under the water often upside down, they move around the pool quite a bit and swim several lengths during the routine. But it’s the precision and synchronicity of the movements that is so impressive. Imagine trying to remember a 5 minute dance routine, in close formation with 7 other girls, much of it performed under water with no goggles, with only the music to help you keep in time. It was amazing and we were very impressed.
After a break we moved on to the Age Group Competitions, we watched solos, duets and Team Combination routines, from 12 year olds through to 18 year olds. There were more entries than we expected although, like speed swimming there were certain areas that only had one entry per age group. Again we were blown away by the standard of competition, watching these little 12 year olds perform such difficult routines with grace and precision was a real treat, and we became converts to synchronised swimming.
The organisation of the competition could have been a bit smoother, the scoring was slow, and the poor girls were left standing, after their routine, often up to 5 minutes whilst the scoring was sorted out, which I didn’t think was fair. The Presidents, including myself, made the presentations at the end of each session and that wasn’t as slick as it could have been we spent ages waiting for them to get organised. In fact it was well after 9pm before we left the pool. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for the 12 year olds who had been at the pool since 7.30am in the morning for warm up, competed last at 8.30pm at night, followed by the presentations etc, and then had to be back at the pool again at 7.30am for warm up for the following days competition, speed swimmers you don’t know you are born.
We have seen both Water Polo and Synchro in three weeks which means the impression of both competitions are still fresh in our minds. I asked John, as a non swimming man, which he preferred and was not surprised when he said the Synchro. Whilst not wanting to take anything away from the Water Polo Players, who are strong, agile and very fit young men, our admiration for the strength, fitness, power, grace, technical ability and precision of the Synchro Girls is tremendous.
I have one more duty to perform this year when I will be travelling to Liverpool on the 12th December to watch the Arena League Division 2 and Premier Division Finals. I’m looking forward to some great team swimming.
Last weekend I
went down to Stockport to the National Senior Schools Championships. It was a really good
event with schools from all round the country taking part. I was the only
Regional President attending so did all the presentations alongside the
President of ESSA.
Plymouth College dominated the finals gaining 8 of the 14 gold medals, followed by Millfield School with 3, and two other schools managing to claim a gold.
What was really pleasing for me, was to see a team from Ulverston Victoria High school taking part in the competition in both the Freestyle and Medley relays, the boys (Sean Spencer, Joe Elwood, Jacky Wicks and Jarrod Minnican) did really well getting into the final for the Medley event, finishing 7th and finishing 9th in the Freestyle. I have coached all the boys in the past so it’s really good to see them doing do well.
I was presented with a lovely bouquet of flowers, and had lunch with the Mayor of Stockport and her husband. The hospitality of the ESSA officials was superb. The downside was the parking fees at Stockport, the cheapest is £10 the dearest £15 for the day, which I think is extortionate. Driving home was rather hazardous as the rain was extremely heavy, but other than that I had a great day.
This weekend (February 13th) I have been to Ponds Forge at Sheffield to the British University LC Championships. I was a bit anxious about driving to Sheffield on my own as it’s a long time since I have been there; John can’t accompany me at the moment as he is busy lambing! Anyway, having my Tom Tom is a fantastic help (although I am still struggling to work it properly), but I arrived in Sheffield in plenty of time. I met up with Don Nate, who is the President of the ASA, and we sat on poolside to watch the afternoon session. Don is a really nice man, down to earth, and with fantastic stamina; he watches all of the sessions from morning until late evening, which is impressive for someone who is well into his 70’s.
There was some great swimming and some big name swimmers there from British Swimming, so I was able to see swimmers like Becky Adlington, Francesca Halsall, Gemma Spofforth, Stephanie Proud, Lizzie Simmonds, Ryan Bennett, Ross Davenport and Liam Tancock all of whom are hoping to be at the 2012 Olympics. Their training, now, is all focused on the Olympics and getting a place on the British Team, and from what I saw we’re going to have many more ladies than men with medal chances.
Again it was
really nice to see two young swimmers from Cumbria
taking part, Daniel Heeley from Carlisle was representing Sunderland University and Laura Huggon from Penrith was representing Sheffield University and
both were making finals. It’s so good to see swimmers that I have, in a small
way, trained/helped/watched within the Cumbrian scene, swimming at such a high
level and doing so well. Another ex Cumbrian swimmer that I was talking to was
Barrow's Matt Bowe, Matt has hung up his competition trunks now and is starting
on the coaching path. He is very fortunate in having the opportunity to become
one of the Loughborough University Coaching Team, so is going to be able to
learn from the most successful coaching team in the country at this time.
Loughborough won the competition quite convincingly. It was interesting to note the Loughborough team's back stroke start, they have their feet high out of the water, and pull themselves up vertically (noticeably higher than anybody else) and then they push off almost horizontally over the water; they believe it is much faster. It was also interesting to watch the ‘step forward’ or ‘moving’ relay takeovers, some people standing with both feet at the back of the blocks and some with only one. Unfortunately some of the swimmers using this technique weren’t, technically, the most efficient and I can’t help feeling it is an accident waiting to happen. I would be very wary of teaching young swimmers this technique.
Some of you may know Ian Proud, who runs the electronic timing for us at the Kendal age groups, the Cumbria Autumn Series and the Ulverston open meet, he was running the timing system for this event, and it’s nice to note that he was having just as many problems to sort out as he does for us. It made me feel a lot better!
Don, myself and Alan (the president of the South East Region) made the presentations, and again just like our competitions, some of the swimmers did not turn up for the medal presentations. I presented two gold medals to Liam Tancock (neither of them to Liam himself as he was swimming down ready for his next race), but eventually after the last relay he turned up with the Loughborough team and I got to shake his hand.
I also presented Jo Jackson with her 400m gold medal this morning, before heading home and driving another 170 miles in pouring rain! There’s always a downside.
Next weekend I’m off to Manchester (I know my way there - so no problem with the driving) for the Water Polo Championships, the weekend after that it will be Carlisle for the start of the Cumbria age groups (working instead of watching) and the following week it’s back to Manchester for the British Championships so I’ve got lots more driving ahead, lets hope the weather improves!
February 23rd 2011I went to Manchester on Saturday 19th February morning to attend the British Gas Water Polo Championships, setting off early to arrive in Manchester before 9am. This was a weekend competition with the play-offs taking place on the Saturday and the Ladies 3rd/4th place game and 1st/2nd place games taking place in the morning followed by the men’s in the afternoon.
The first game was an all London affair with the London Otters taking on the London Penguins, it was a really good game, very close with the Penguins being in the lead for most of the match and the Otters catching up, excitingly they scored in the last minute taking the match into a draw. After a 5 minute break they played 3 minutes each way extra time, and the Penguins just edged ahead to claim the third place position. It was a really good game. The ladies game is played in a 25m pool and is a little slower than the men’s, so it’s easier to follow. There seems to be more tactics employed too. Nevertheless it's still quite a rough game and I wouldn’t play centre forward for anything, they seem to spend the vast majority of their time being climbed all over by the defenders, or being pushed under the water!The finals match was a Northern affair, with Manchester taking on Liverpool; Manchester were the hot favourites. Once again it was really nice to see a Cumbrian swimmer taking part (Nicola Powley of Carlisle Water Polo competing as part of the Liverpool team). Consequentially I was routing for Liverpool and they did a really good job for the first three quarters of the game, but Manchester came out very strongly in the final quarter and won the game comfortably in the end by 9-5.
As the President of the NW region I was asked to present the Gold medals to the winning team which was great, although it’s quite difficult getting 14 medals round necks in a short space of time. Still as it was girls and they weren’t on a podium I didn’t have the usual problem of being able to reach.
Unfortunately I wasn’t able to stop for the men’s games in the afternoon, but I did notice that another Cumbrian swimmer was playing for Lancaster (Mark Robinson from Kendal). Mark is following in big brother Glenn’s footsteps as this is where Glenn started before progressing into the international ranks and moving to a Hungarian club for experience. Lancaster had been beaten unexpectedly in the play offs and so were playing for third place which they won in a 10-8 victory over Cheltenham. Manchester were beaten by Bristol for the final in a hard fought game finishing 6-5.
It was a very enjoyable occasion.
March 16th 2011
Last week was the British Swimming Championships at the Manchester Aquatics Centre. There were several swimmers from Cumbria who had achieved the qualifying time and were able to take part in this competition: Craig Elliot, Andrew Mayor, Joe Elwood, Fraser Minnican, Jack Barker, Anna Newlands and Lucy McKenzie all competed, and I hope they enjoyed the experience and learnt from it. I certainly did.
I
was only able to go for 2 days competition, Thursday and Friday, and
unfortunately I underestimated the traffic into Manchester on a weekday
morning, so was very annoyed at myself for missing Fraser's 100m Butterfly swim.
Martin Tickner who was officiating told me
he had had a very good swim.
I did, however, manage to catch Andy Mayor in the later heats. He qualified comfortably for the semi finals which took place in the evening session. I also watched Lucy McKenzie in the 200m Backstroke. It really was nice to watch Cumbrian swimmers taking part in this level of competition.
The
evening finals session was very good, I was sitting with Don Neate (ASA
President), Anne Clark (Director of British Swimming) and Kay Grimshaw who is on the
ASA Management Board, all really lovely people. It is interesting to listen to people,
who are at the centre of the ASA, and it does make me wonder how the ASA can
get things so wrong (sometimes) when there are such intelligent, committed and
down to earth people involved.
After a great nights swimming I was lucky enough to make the presentations to the medal winners of the Mens 200m Finals, the last event of the evening.
On Friday morning it was back to the pool for another day of heats. Featuring Francesca Halsall in the 50m Freestyle, Liam Tancock in the 50m Backstroke and David Davies in the 1500m Freestyle, quite a mornings swimming.
But the evening finals session was even better. It was fantastic. British swimming is trying to raise the profile of swimming, and to make it a more "audience orientated" sport but it isn’t easy to do. I was seated in the VIP area with James Hickman, Steve Parry, Graham Smith, James Goddard and Duncan Goodhew all in the seats behind.
The first Gold medal of the evening was won by Jessica Sylvester in the 50m Fly. Followed by Adam Brown in the 50m Freestyle. There was a wonderful 200m Backstroke Final with Stephanie Proud, Gemma Spofforth and Lizzie Simmonds all fighting for the medals, with a fabulous victory for Stephanie Proud. (For those of you who go to Age Groups at Kendal, Ian Proud does the electronic timing for us, and Steph is his daughter).
The
100m Fly final was up next, with Michael Rock and Andrew Mayor in the line up.
Many years ago when the winner of the Diddy League Grand Final went on to
represent Cumbria in the Speedo Junior League Northern Area Final,
Ulverston had the pleasure of representing Cumbria on several occasions. City
of Liverpool was always in this competition, and two of the 10
year old swimmers competing against us were Francesca Halsall and Michael Rock. I remember distinctly because even then Fran Halsall was an
outstanding young swimmer, and Johnathon Moses (a very talented Ulverston
swimmer) was beating Michael Rock.
I actually turned down the opportunity to present the medals to the Ladies 800m Freestyle but chose to present them to the Mens 100m Butterfly, in the hope that I would be able to give Michael Rock a Gold medal and Andy Mayor (an ex CC swimmer) a medal of any colour. Michael did win the Gold, and Andy had a brilliant swim but was just edged out of the Bronze medal position by 0.3 seconds.I took immense pride in giving Michael his medal, but a small part of me thinks it was a bit stupid not to take the opportunity to present Rebecca Adlington with her Gold Medal for the 800m swim!!
The whole session is set up for the BBC with everything stage managed and timed to the last second. It’s a great pity that the BBC don’t actually show much of it on the TV.
For many of the swimmers at this competition, this will be the start of the long road to London 2012 and I hope we see some of the NW region's swimmers in that competition.
April 12th 2011
Back on the road again, I was back down in Manchester yesterday, for the Lancashire Age Groups final session. It was a bit of an eye opener as far as Age Groups are concerned. This was the second weekend of their competition, held at Manchester Aquatic centre in the 50m pool. When I arrived the whole of the balcony was full, something I’ve never seen before not even for the British Championships. What an advantage this must be for these young swimmers when it gets to North West Regionals, they’ve been there, done that and seen it all already.
It’s a very different experience to the Cumbria Age groups; it is such an enormous event, and so many swimmers. For example in the 200m Freestyle event there were 23 Heats and remember it’s an 8 lane pool, in the 50m Freestyle there were 26 Heats. That’s probably more swimmers in one event than we have altogether. Because there is such strength and depth in the number of swimmers the standard of swimming is very high, but interestingly like Cumbria, it’s the same swimmers who arrive for presentation time and again.
Obviously with this kind of financial backing they were able to present medals to all the winners (at least I presented them yesterday), and medals for Championship Winners. They also have very nice plates for the BAGCAT winners. They are also able to make even more money by selling T shirts and hoodies with all of the swimmers names on. It’s a very different ball game.
The nice thing about the Cumbria Age Groups is that with us being small we get to know all the swimmers, well at least we hope that’s a good thing.
Next stop is Liverpool for the North West Regional Youth Championships, in two weeks’ time. Hopefully I’ll have the opportunity of presenting medals to some swimmers from Cumbria.
May 2nd 2011John and I have been down to Liverpool this weekend to watch the NW Regional Youth Championships, and we have seen some good swimming, although I don’t think Liverpool is one of the fastest pools in the region, which is a shame as it is the newest 50m facility we have.
It was lovely to see so many swimmers from the county competing at this level; there were swimmers from Barrow, City of Carlisle, Copeland, Cockermouth, and Ulverston (over half the teams in Cumbria) and they all sat together and helped each other - coaches and swimmers - which was really good to see.
It’s worth remembering that at an event like this the Cumbrian swimmers are competing against swimmers from all the big regional squads, who have far better facilities and much more pool time than ours have available to them, so to see a lot of them getting into finals and a few getting medals is a credit to the swimmers themselves and their coaches.
Day 1
The finalists from Cumbria were:
Curtis Corrie (Barrow) in the 400m Free, Anna Broadbent (Cockermouth) in the 50m Back and 50m Free, Victoria Hevey (Ulverston) in the 50m Back, Joe Elwood
representing City of Manchester
Aquatics (Ulverston) in the
200m Fly and 50m Fly, Jack Barker (City of Carlisle) who won the Gold medal in the 50m
Breast and Silver in the 200m Breast, Grace Newlands (Copeland) in the 100m Breast, Fraser Minnican (Ulverston) who won the Gold medal in the 400m IM, Ashleigh Dale (Barrow) who won Silver in the 100m Fly, Lucy McKenzie (Cockermouth) in the 200m IM and 200m Back, Austin Wilson (Ulverston) in the 50m Fly, Jack Kenwright (City of Carlisle) in the 50m Fly,
Day 2
Again the finalists were:
Curtis Corrie (Barrow) in the 200m Free and Silver medal in the 800m Free, Oliver Atkinson (Ulverston) in the 50m Back and the 50m Free, Jack Kenwright (City of Carlisle) in the 50m Back, Joe Elwood (CoManchester Aquatics/Ulverston) in the 100m Fly, 200m Back and Silver medal in the 50m Back, Grace Newlands (Copeland) in the 50m Breast, Jack Barker (City of Carlisle) Gold medal in the 100m Breast and Silver in the 50m Free, Fraser Minnican (Ulverston) in the 100m Fly and Silver in the 200m IM, Victoria Hevey (Ulverston) in the 100m Back and the 50m Fly, Ashleigh Dale (Barrow) Silver in the 200m Fly and Bronze in the 50m Fly, Lucy McKenzie (Cockermouth) in the 200m Breast, Grace Newlands (Copeland) in the 200m Breast, Andrew Kerr (Barrow) in the 200m Back, Ashleigh Backhouse (Cockermouth) in the 50m Fly
21 finalsts today, all 5 clubs represented, 5 Medal winners, 1 Bronze and 1 Silver medal for Ashleigh, Silver for Curtis, Joe and Fraser, and Silver and Gold for Jack. Congratulations swimmers a really good effort over a very hard weekend.
My swimmer of the meet from Cumbria would be Jack Barker from City of Carlisle with 2 Medals each day, 2 Silvers and 2 Golds a fantastic achievement on 8 hours training a week. If you keep this up Jack and when you get more pool time you’re going to FLY.
As I said before my husband does not have a swimming background and although it was a very long, hot weekend he really enjoyed himself and is now familiar with a lot of swimmers from around the county. Well done swimmers.
Congratulations also to Becky Whalley from Copeland, Zarina Wilson, Katy Gunson, Samantha Blundell, Clara Minnican and Georgia Hevey all from Ulverston gaining qualification times; swimming at Regional’s is an achievement in itself and something to be proud of. I hope you all enjoyed the experience and it encouraged you to continue with your training and set goals for the future. (I apologise if I have missed anybody out).
John and I had a super weekend, its lovely to see Cumbrian swimmers achieving so much, and I am so proud to be able to present medals to our top achievers.
Good luck to you all at the Inter Association event at the end of the month, and I look forward to seeing some of our younger swimmers at the Regional Age Group Championships in June.
P.S. My thanks also to Keith Minnican, who acted as ‘official photographer’ for the County; if he has taken any good ones and sends them to me I will forward them to put on the Website at a later date.
June 6th 2011Well after a month off it’s been back to the Presidential Duties this weekend. I have been back down to Manchester for the Regional Age Group Championships and like the youths it was lovely to see so many swimmers from Cumbria. There were swimmers from City of Carlisle, Cockermouth, Copeland, Kendal, Ulverston and Workington, six teams represented – great to see.
For many of these young swimmers this event is their first opportunity to compete in a 50m pool, several of the swimmers achieved better times than their entry times, which is a very good effort, as most of their times would have been achieved in a short course pool.
Saturday 4th June high-lights:
Congratulations to the 12 swimmers who made the finals.
Thomas Milburn, Cockermouth, 1500m
Freestyle, Gold Medal (13 year age group)
Anna Newlands, Cockermouth, 400m IM, Silver Medal (13 year age group)
Josh Milburn, Cockermouth, 100m
Breaststroke, 7th (10 year age group)
Thomas Milburn, Cockermouth, 100m Breaststroke, Gold Medal (13 year age group)
Eden Joy Light, Ulverston, 100m Backstroke, 6th (10 year age group)
Zara McNight, Co Carlisle, 100m Backstroke, 7th (11 year age group)
Rebecca Clark, Cockermouth, 100m Backstroke, Silver Medal (12 year age group)
Isaac Hinde, Copeland, 200m Fly, Bronze Medal (10 year age group)
Robert McSkeane, Cockermouth, 200m Fly, 5th (10 year age group)
Luke Greenbank, Cockermouth, 200m Fly,
Gold Medal (13 year age group)
Oliver Smith, Cockermouth, 200m Fly, 5th (14 year age group)
Anna Newlands, Cockermouth, 200m Freestyle, 5th (13 year age group)
It was really pleasing for me to be able to present medals to swimmers from Cumbria and the above did really really well to win 1 Bronze, 2 Silver and 3 Golds. Well done all of you.
Sunday 5th June high-lights:
Another long day at the Regional Age Groups and quite a successful day for the Cumbrian swimmers, again 5 teams were represented which is a very good effort from the young swimmers of Cumbria.
Today’s finalists were:
Anna Newlands, Cockermouth, 400m Freestyle, 4th (13 year age group)
Thomas Milburn, Cockermouth, 100m Freestyle, 6th (13 year age group)
Oliver Smith, Cockermouth, 100m Freestyle, 5th (14 year age group)
Rebecca Fell, Ulverston, 100m Fly, 4th (10 year age group) [Rebecca was perhaps the unluckiest girl in the pool today finishing 4th and missing out on the medals by 1/100th of a second, but it was a superb PB and great effort by this 10 year old swimmer).
Laura Davison, Co Carlisle, 100m
Fly, 5th (11 year age group)
Eve White, Co Carlisle, 100m Fly, 8th (11 year age group)
Anna Newlands, Cockermouth, 100m Fly, Silver medal (13 year age group)
Luke Greenbank, Cockermouth, 200m
Backstroke, Bronze Medal (13 year age group)
Thomas Milburn, Cockermouth, 200m Backstroke, 6th (13 year age group)
Oliver Smith, Cockermouth, 200m Backstroke, Silver medal (14 year age group)
Jasmin Pritt, Workington, 200m Breaststroke, 5th (10 year age group)
Eden Joy Light, Ulverston, 200m Breaststroke, 6th (10 year age group)
Rebecca Fell, Ulverston, 200m
Breaststroke, 7th (10 year age group)
Thomas Milburn, Cockermouth, 200m IM, Silver medal (13 year age group)
Luke Greenbank, Cockermouth, 200m
IM, 4th (13 year age group)
Oliver Smith, Cockermouth, 200m IM, 6th (13 year age group)
Congratulations to all the above, although we had more swimmers making finals today there were less medal winners, with 1 Bronze and 3 Silvers although there were two very near misses in 4th place.
Next weekend will see the second part of the competition, I can’t attend this as it’s my son’s wedding, so I would like to take this opportunity to wish all the young swimmers from around the County the very best of luck. Keep up the good work, swim well and enjoy and learn from the experience.
I’m off to Sheffield in a couple of weeks to attend the ASA National Championships, and after that in July it will be back to Sheffield for the ASA Age Group Diving Championships, which I am really looking forward to as I have so wanted to see some diving.
June 18th 2011
Last week John and I went down to Sheffield to attend the ASA National Championships, this is basically the English championships, and we were down for two days, Thursday and Friday.We attended the heats on Thursday morning and were lucky enough to see several swimmers from Cumbria competing; Daniel Healey, formerly of City of Carlisle in the 50m Freestyle, Joe Elwood of Ulverston and City of Manchester Aquatics in the 100m Backstroke, Craig Elliott of Cockermouth in the 50m Breast stroke, and Fraser Minnican (Ulverston) in the 400m IM.
Fantastic experience for all these guys swimming with the crème of the country's swimmers. In the evening Finals session once again we saw Craig Elliot in the 50m Breast stroke who missed out on the Bronze medal by a finger tip in a super swim. We also had the privilege of watching Rebecca Adlington swimming and winning Gold in the 800m Freestyle - this lady is one class act. I had the honour of presenting Simon Burnett with the Gold Medal for the 50m Freestyle, what a super swimmer he is, and he is an incredibly good looking young man up close with a ‘Colgate’ white smile! It was a super nights swimming.
We were back at the pool on Friday morning, and saw Rebecca Adlington swim in the 400m Free and Simon Burnett in the 100m Free. We also saw Andy Mayor, formerly of City of Carlisle in the 50m Butterfly heats. Andy swam really well making the final comfortably. We also saw Jemma Lowe and Hannah Miley swimming. The evening session was the last of the week and was once again an excellent evening of swimming. I was sat next to the Lord Mayor of Sheffield all evening so was on my best behaviour. I presented the Men’s 200m IM medals, so once again had to ask the guys to bend down to my level so that I could actually get the medals over their heads! Rebecca Adlington showed her class once again, as did Simon Burnett both winning Gold medals. Andy Mayor competed in the 50m Fly, the final event of the competition, and he had a super swim (although not the best start) finishing equal 4th. However as the man that won the silver medal was a foreign national he was only allowed to win a commemorative medal, so we ended up with 5 people collecting medals on the podium, a record I think. This was the Gold Medal winner, Silver and Silver Commemorative, and the equal Bronzes, it was lovely to see a Cumbrian swimmer receive a medal, a good way to end the day.
We really enjoyed the two days and felt privileged to see the top swimmers in the country competing for a place in the team to go to Shanghai. It was lovely to see swimmers, which I have known for years, taking part at this level of competition; even John is recognising the boys now.
The disappointing thing was how few people where watching the competition, how the swimming was sold out for the Olympics amazes me. Not that I am bitter about not getting tickets!!
Anyway next up for John and I (personal circumstances permitting) is another trip to Sheffield to see the Age Group Diving competition, I’d really like to attend this competition in July as I haven’t seen any Diving yet. So Fingers crossed we can make it.
July 18th 2011
John and I went down to Sheffield again last week this time for the British Gas National Age Group Diving Championships, and what a super couple of days we had.
The first afternoon was the Synchro Diving starting with the 8/13year 1m board; both boys and girl’s competitions taking part at the same time so there is something to watch all the time. This was followed by the 14/18 year 3m Synchro again both boys and girls competition running at the same time. The standard was amazing and we were absolutely enthralled. These tiny little kids have no fear and such poise and strength, it was brilliant. The older group obviously had even more skills and the dives became more complex, some of them are so close to the board when they dive I was cringing for them, they must only be inches away from cracking their heads open.
We enjoyed it all so much that we decided to stay behind at the end of the competition to watch the practice; you have never seen anything like it!! There were 12 different diving stations around the pool ranging from the 1m springboards all the way through to the 10m platform, and around 60 kids of all ages swarmed out of the changing rooms and up onto the boards and platforms all throwing themselves off these boards in complete abandon - we just sat there in awe and a fair amount of fear, it looked like chaos. These kids are amazing.
On Friday we were at the pool at 9am and throughout the day we watched 1m and 3m springboard (individual competition) and platform diving from 5m, 7.5m and 10m. You have to be 12 before you can go off the 10m platform. Again the agility, strength and courage of these young divers took our breath away and we soon became aficionados saying to each other things like, they over rotated on that one or they didn’t quite nail the entry on that one, or look at the splash on entry!!
The dives where the divers go into a handstand on the platform are spectacular especially when they have the strength to hold the handstand for a minute before rolling into the dive. I spoke to some of the coaches and the younger divers at the age of 11 have been diving for 6 years, yes they start at the tender age of 4/5, no wonder they are so good and have no fear at 11/12. It has certainly inspired us to want to go to a top level diving competition in the future if possible.
The one disappointment of the two days was there were no divers from Manchester competing, we have a superb facility in the NW at Manchester but apparently don’t have a good diving club because they can not get enough training time. What an awful waste.
Due to difficult family circumstances I’ve not been able to fulfil my Presidential Duties recently, which I’m disappointed with. But family has had to come first.
We missed the National Age group championships altogether - we were due to go down for two days - but I believe there was some good swimming by the young swimmers of Cumbria. The following week we were scheduled to go to Sheffield for the National Youth Championships, but our daughter had her baby early and we wanted to go and see them, so we made a flying visit for one day on our way down to London.
This was to be my last appearance at a swimming competition before my year comes to an end, so I was very keen to attend. I wanted the opportunity to say a big thank you to Don Neate (the ASA President) in person, he is a lovely man and has made my year so enjoyable meeting up with him at the various competitions. He is a true gentleman, and very knowledgeable about swimming, it has been an honour to work with him.
John and I were able to watch the heats of the Youth Championships on the Friday morning, and we were lucky enough to see Joe Elwood from Ulverston put in a storming performance in the 200m backstroke to win by a mile and progress into the semi finals as second fastest swimmer. We should have been at the finals session in the evening which would have given us the opportunity to watch another Cumbrian/Ulverston swimmer, but I’m afraid the call to visit my first grandson was just too much and we left for London as soon as the heats finished. I was really sorry to miss Joe’s semi final swim and Fraser Minnican’s final in the 200m IM where he finished in third place gaining the Bronze medal, both excellent performances by these two young men. It would have been lovely to end my year as President by presenting a medal to a Cumbrian swimmer, but I’m afraid the thought of a cuddle from my grandson was just to tempting.
John and I have really enjoyed our year; we have driven hundreds of miles and seen most of the swimming disciplines. We now recognise a lot of the swimmers from around the North West and have enjoyed watching their progress. We have seen swimmers from Cumbria compete at all levels, County, Regional, University and National level, and I have had the honour of presenting medals at all these competitions. We have seen top class water polo, both men’s and women’s competition. We have become converts to Synchro and Diving, the swimmers for these two competitions have amazing fitness, precision and artistry and we will definitely try to go to see some more of these competitions in the future.
We have visited some of the top pools in the country and John now knows what I have been doing for the last 25 years and has met some of the wonderful people that I work with. In short we have had a super year and I’m extremely grateful for the opportunity that we have had, it has been a pleasure and an honour to represent Cumbria and the North West Region.
My year comes to an end at the Region’s annual conference on 3rd September where I will officially hand over the chain of office.
Thank you, Karen Bowes
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