This Is Guernsey

MEDALS and personal-best times were the rewards for 32 members of the Guernsey Swimming Club who competed at the Jersey Summer Gala. The event, held at the eight-lane, 25-metre pool at Les Quennevais, was for swimmers of 13 years and under.

Some of the young Guernsey contingent were competing outside their home pool for the first time.

The meeting was seeded on entry times into A and B grade events. It was possible, if swimmers exceeded their entry time by too great a margin, to receive a ’speeding ticket’.

Matt Girard, in the most senior age group, won the best-boy-of-the-meet trophy in A-grade events with his haul of six golds and two silvers.

His best swims came in freestyle events and in particular the 100m, in which he recorded an impressive time of 1min. 04.23sec.

In the same age group, newcomer Alex Ford was close behind in the overall points total with six golds and one silver. He won two breaststroke events in the A division, over 50m and 100m, and also picked up a cache of B-grade medals.

In the 11-year-and-under group, GSC was represented by six girls. Amelia Ingrouille won gold in the B 100m IM and added two B-grade silvers. Elisha Benstead won gold in the B 50m butterfly and silver in the 50 free. Ella Snell took first place in the the A 50m backstroke and added a silver and a bronze.

In the 12-year-old boys’ category, Adam Norman had a very busy day, competing in nine events. Five of those were swum in personal-best times. Gold came his way in the B 100m freestyle, along with four silvers and one bronze.

In the 10-year-old-boys category, the only speeding ticket obtained by GSC came from Dominic O’Brien in the 100 IM.

His seven-second PB time of 1min. 45.00sec. was outside of the three seconds allowed for the qualifying time for the B Division for this event.

O’Brien continued with his personal-best swims and took nine seconds off his previous best time for the 100m breaststroke. This time was rewarded with gold in the B Division.

Also in this age group, golds came from Daniel Brittain in the B 50m freestyle and James Hewlett in the 100m IM with a time of 1-56.92, a huge 13 seconds faster than he had swum before.

In the 10-year-old girls’ category, Sophie Lythgoe starred for her club with five personal bests out of five swims and she well deserved her three golds and a silver medal, all in the A division.

There were no A or B divisions in the nine-years-old age grou. GSC members dominated the boys’ events. Luke Winberg completed a clean sweep with five golds out of five events.

In the 50m freestyle, he was closely followed by Aaron Mahieu, who won silver, and Alexander Penney, bronze.

In the breaststroke event over the same distance, GSC had five out of the top six swimmers. Pierce Gregory continued the medal haul in this age group with two silvers. Penney also won a silver in the breaststroke and Mahieu a bronze in the 100 IM.

In total, 66 medals were won by GSC, 30 were gold, 26 silver and 10 bronze. Over the day, Guernsey Swimming Club swimmers competed in 168 swims, recording 89 personal best swims.

Performance awards were given to one boy and one girl from each of the four competing clubs. The two prizes of sports equipment were won by nine-year-old Harry Andrews, for his outstanding PBs, and Amelia Anderson who recorded four PBs out of eight events.

Article posted on 31st July, 2004 - 12.00am