Schools had broken up, festive celebrations had begun and pre-Christmas trips to deliver presents to far-flung relatives were underway.
But, four of our swimmers had a busy schedule of their own over the weekend of 19th and 20th December.
They were taking part in Notts ASA’s winter open meet, the Festive Frenzy, with awards for the top three swimmers of each age group in every event.
The long course times to be registered at this double-the-distance pool would have to be converted to short course (25m) times for the purpose of County Qualifying Times and our own Club PB records. However, that tech-y bit would have to wait. Action was what was called for now, and action’s what we got!
Session 1. One girl, two races. First up, the 200m freestyle – Gaby Marriott went for it! She set a new Personal Best, a massive 12 seconds faster than her previous(!), 4 seconds within the County Time, and finished 10th in the 12 & Under category. She then achieved another County Time in 200m backstroke, finishing 8th. Fantastic!
200 proved a favourable number for Edward Roberts too in the evening, Session 2! He swam a smooth, fast 200m freestyle, knocked nearly 5 seconds off his former PB and finished 3rd in 14/u boys. Wonderful!
Bright and early on Sunday, Edward returned, but this time with Anna Beesley and Beatrice Munro for company in Session 3.
Firstly, Anna raced a New Time in the 100m freestyle, slashing her 50m PB by 7 seconds in the process in the first half of the race! Great!
Beatrice followed in the same event, knocked over 2 seconds off her previous best, 4.5 seconds under the County Qualifying Time and finished 4th in age group. Wow!
Edward was back for the back – the 100m backstroke. He set his second PB of the Meet and gained 1st place award. Fabulous!
Anna swam a really good race in the 200m Individual Medley and set a great new time for the event as well as for the first leg of it – the 50m fly. Well done Anna!
In the closing Session 4, Edward stormed to a 3 second PB in 100m freestyle, in 5th place; Beatrice also achieved a PB in 100m backstroke, 2 seconds under the County Time and finished 2nd. Amazing!
Finally, Edward attained another faster-than-ever-before time in 100m breaststroke!
Every single swim by the Portland swimmers over this weekend was either a New Time or PB – Edward with PBs in all four of his events!
Anna took on two completely new events establishing a benchmark of good first times.
Gaby and Beatrice qualified for the 2016 County Championships in both their events.
Congratulations and well done to all four swimmers!
Thank you to Guy for being our poolside coach.
