Swim Wales Summer Nationals

Swim Wales Summer Nationals

City of Newport swimmers celebrate an outstanding 2013-2014 season culminating in the Swim Wales summer nationals.

Swim Wales summer nationals is the main competition for many swimmers in any season, and this year City of Newport swimmers enjoyed their best performance at this meet. The meet held over seven days at the Wales National pool Swansea (WNPS) was attended by 30 Newport swimmers, each swimming multiple events.

Day 1
Event 3 saw the first Newport Finalist with Ben Holloway recording a new best time in the 100m Butterfly, event 4 finals included Scarlet Major and Megan Alison who both picked up Bronze in their respective age categories before Lewis Waters smashed the 200 Breaststroke to take Gold by a massive 4 seconds. Paige Simmons also took Gold in the 800m Freestyle. In the last event of the session Katie English and Scarlet Major swam the 50m Freestyle final, with Scarlet just 0.4 seconds off picking up a second Bronze medal of the day.

Day 2
Event 13 had three Newport swimmers in it, Mia Board and Paige Simmons in the 11 years category, both of whom recorded new best times with Paige going under the 3 minute marker for the first time to win Gold by 7 seconds. The 12 years category saw Ellana Horton take the Bronze with a massive 12 second Personal Best (PB) time also going under 3 minutes for the first time.

Day 3
In Event 28 Aiden Bryce made the final of the boys 100m Backstroke finishing in a time just 1.99 seconds shy of the medals. Emme Thomas made her first medal appearance with a silver in the 800m Freestyle. Events 33 and 34 showed Newport’s dominance in the Breaststroke again with Mia Board finishing in Bronze medal position in the 11 years age group and Ellana Horton only 0.4 of a second off doing the same in the 12 years category, before Tristan Cuer rounded off the day with a complete domination in the boys 15-16 Breaststroke finishing in a very convincing first place.

Day 4
In the second event of the day Scarlet Major smashed the 10 years 100 Freestyle to win by a convincing 2 seconds, she then followed this up 20 minutes later with an even more dramatic win finishing almost 8 seconds in front of her nearest rival in the 200m Individual Medley (IM) thanks to a very dominate Breaststroke leg. In the 20 minutes between Scarlet’s swims Katie English and Megan Alison were busy with the 100m Freestyle finals with the latter taking her second Bronze medal of the meet so far. That busy 20 minute period also saw Max Harris in the 200 IM, equalling his time from the morning’s heats.

Day 5
Day 5 saw Breaststroke medallists Paige Simmons and Ellana Horton in the 200m Backstroke both recording new PB’s with Paige adding a Bronze medal to her collection. In addition Emme Thomas and Paige Simmons both took Golds in their respective age categories and both with NEW MEET RECORDS, Paige finishing a very dominate 6 seconds ahead of second place.

Day 6
Max Harris opened proceedings for the City of Newport on day 6 with a good PB in the 200m Freestyle before Scarlet Major once again dominated the competition adding to her medal count with 5 second annihilation also in the 200m Freestyle. Emme Thomas showed her strength once again as a middle distance/ distance Freestyler with an outstanding Bronze in the 200m Freestyle swimming inside the old meet record. Lewis Waters was back in action in Event 72 finishing third in the 15-16 100m Breaststroke less than 1 second off Gold medal position to back up his Gold earlier in the week in the 200m Breaststroke. In Event 76 Ben Holloway smashed his PB to finish under 0.4 of a second outside the medals in the boys 200 Fly before Megan Allison finished just 0.05 of a second outside the medals in the girls 200 Fly.

Day 7 (Final Day)
Max Harris once again opened proceedings for Newport this time in the 100m Breaststroke, showing what an all-round talent he is (having made finals in IM, Freestyle, Backstroke and now Breaststroke) with another good PB. Mia Board and Ellana Horton then completed a clean sweep of Breaststroke Finals adding the 100m to their 50m and 200m Finals from earlier in the week. Just to show even more strength in depth where Breaststroke is concerned Alice Manship added to the medal count with a Bronze in the 100 Breaststroke in the 13 years age category. Ellana Horton finished the meet off in style with a good PB in the final of the girls 50 Backstroke.

Summary
Over 95% PB rate, 35 Finals, 19 Medals of which 9 were Gold, need I say anymore other than to congratulate all Newport swimmers on an outstanding meet to cap off an outstanding season. Keep up the hard work and let’s have an even better 2014-2015 season.