It has been a busy few weeks for Mount Kelly swimmers on the international stage:
Luxembourg Euro Meet 2024
There were some brilliant swims from our fantastic five out in Luxembourg last month against an incredibly strong field of swimmers, which included the likes of David Popovici and Sarah Sjöström!
- Sophie made the A Final of the 200m Breaststroke with a brilliant early season time of 2.32.42 as well as a 1.13.69 in the B Final of the 100m Breaststroke
- Blythe finished 4th in the A Final of the 50m Backstroke with a 28.70 as well as winning the Junior age group. She also made the B Final of the 100m Backstroke finishing with a time of 1.03.95.
- Hollie was in fine form, making B Finals of the 50m Butterfly, 100m Butterfly and 200m Ind. Medley (which she won in a time of 2.18.38)
- Jonathan produced four lifetime bests in the 100m Freestyle, 50m Butterfly, 50m Backstroke and 100m Backstroke, just missing out on progression to finals.
- Oliver swam some strong early season distance swims with a second best time ever in his 800m Freestyle of 8.25.31 off the back of the British Swimming distance camp held in Loughborough.
Lisbon International
Seven Mount Kelly swimmers raced at the Lisbon International meet under the Swim England South West hat, producing some fine February swims, under Neil Edwards leadership as head coach.
The youngest member, Edie took Gold in the 200 Fly with a huge lifetime best of 2.14.60, followed by the 4 x 100 women’s medley team which featured Edie on the Fly and Beth anchoring on the free.
Individual silver medals were firstly taken by two of our distance swimmers. Sam produced a huge 1500 in a time of 16.12 and Ruby followed suit in the 800 with a 9.09.13. Beth then followed it up with a speedy 2.21.20 in the 200 IM. The Womens 4 x 100 freestyle team then continued the silver streak which included Beth and Chloe on leg 2 and 3. Not to be out done by the women, the Men’s 4 x 100 freestyle team, featuring Alex, took a super silver as well.
All had a wonderful time and were commended on their racing awareness, behaviour, attitude and likeability.
Well done to the whole team who came together and took Top Club!
Dubai Open
Forty-one Mount Kelly athletes headed out to Dubai for the last part of the half term break and raced in an incredible facility for the Dubai Open Swimming Championships. Our swimmers focused on stepping up from heats to finals and developing new race strategies during this mid-cycle international racing opportunity.
Congratulations to Aviva for her 400 IM swim which has qualified her for European Juniors in July.
World Championships Doha
After achieving selection to represent Lithuania in the World Championships in Doha at just 16 years old, Mantas had to dig deep with his Mount Kelly values and process a disqualification in the 50 back due to being under water for 16m rather than 15m. In his press interviews he showed brilliant maturity and plans to learn from this experience and come back stronger and wiser for his next international performance at the European Juniors in July. We are very proud of you Mantas.
Article by Emma Collings-Barnes, Director of Swimming
Categories: Swimming
