Alnwick Dolphins attend North East Regional Swimming Championships

Alnwick Dolphins Swimming club attended the North East Regional Swimming Championships held over three weekends in April and May. The fastest swimmers in the region were competing against each other for Regional medals, finals places and National Qualifying Times.

The qualification times for this event are really challenging as the North East is one of the strongest regions in the country. Alnwick Dolphins sponsored by Alncom took a team of five 10 to 14 year olds made up of Matilda Wilson, Andrew Batley, Ella Wynne, Archie Brown and Emma Owen.

These young swimmers put in some tremendous performances, stepping up to swim on the big stage in the Olympic sized 50m pools in Leeds and Sheffield. Archie, aged 10 years, was competing at the youngest end of his age group and showed his outstanding talent, managing to qualify for the final in the 50m backstroke where he came 8th overall in a time of 35.44 seconds.

Andrew, aged 14 years, competed in the 50m, 100m and 200m breaststroke distances and the 50m freestyle, just missing out on finals, and Emma and Ella swam super personal best times in the 50m freestyle. Ella’s time was 30.37 seconds and Emma’s was 30.23 seconds.

Tilly had a tremendously successful meet, swimming faster than she’s ever swum before including a 30 second personal best time in the 800m freestyle in 10.03.49! She made finals or top 10 places in all her 11 swims and came away with a bronze medal in the 50m breaststroke (37.89), a silver medal in the 50m butterfly (31.14) and an agonising 4th place in the 200 IM (1.36.09). She was fingertips away from Qualifying for the English National Summer Meet and smashed another set of Alnwick Dolphins Club Records!

Alnwick Dolphins’ older swimmers were competing in Sheffield and the team was made up of Tom Robinson, Sandy Brown, William Oliver, Jamie Hodson, Felicity Oliva and Harriet Oldfield.

Tom started with the 100m breaststroke and swam a s 1.15.37- narrowly missing a final place. He did however made the final in the 50m backstroke placing 6th and smashing the 30 second barrier in 29.39 seconds! The 2nd fastest time ever by a dolphin.

He also swam a personal best time (PB) of 57.44 in the 100m freestyle as well as the 50m fly and 200m backstroke to cap a strong weekend.

Sandy was swimming a year young in his age group and had great weekend. Not afraid to tackle any distance he did all the freestyles.

On Friday qualified for the 200m freestyle final, he came 6th in an impressive 2.01.91, just 0.5 secs of a bronze. In that afternoon he swam the 1500m and finished 8th overall in 17.20.30 - he was the 2nd 15 yr old. This was also a big club record!

He also qualified for the 400m freestyle final in a time of 4.18.2 then swam even faster in 4.17.95 to win an amazing bronze medal.

Not done with that, on the Monday he swam the 200m backstroke and the 800m freestyle.

He swam 9.00.55. 3rd 15 yr old, backing up his 8.58 from Scottish National Age Group Championships a month ago. This has put Sandy in line for the Aquatics GB Next Generation British Championships in the summer as well as the English National Summer Meet.

Harriet swam a fantastic 100m breaststroke swim in her fastest time ever, 1.16 winning an amazing bronze medal. She followed this up with an even more impressive gold medal in the 50m breaststroke. She cruised through to the open final and claimed a fantastic gold medal in 34.95. She is proving very strong at this now Olympic event!

Harriet wasn't done there though. Proving she is more than capable over the longer events she made it through to the final of the 200 IM where she secured a hard won bronze. In the process lowering the open club record in 2.28.40.

These swims have qualified her for another year at English Nationals in the summer, a great achievement.

Felicity had a strong 50m fly, she made the u16 final with a time of 30.86 - a really good swim. She also swam the 200m backstroke- just missing a final place.

Jamie, who has had a very quick rise in swimming in the last 2 years qualified for the 50m br. Despite being out of the water for quite a while with a broken wrist swam a very good 50m.

William, a specialist in some of the toughest events, qualified for the final in the 400m Individual medley finishing 6th overall and swam a personal best time of 2.22.71 in the 200m butterfly.

On top of the Individual swims, Harriet, Sandy and Tom were also selected to represent Northumberland and Durham Performance Programme (NDPP) in the relay events.

The Alnwick Dolphins would like to thank Alncom, our principal sponsor for their continued support for the club.