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Well done to Sheila Elliott winner of the special award in today’s Darlington Sports Awards.
Emma Carter (Top Squad) has written the below message as thanks for the support of DASC members at the December Fun Night where Emma had organised a cake stall and competitions.
Thank you to everyone who supported my cake sale at the DASC fun night. The total amount raised was £67.50, which is a huge help. All the guesses to the sweets in the jar competition were very close, but the winner with the closest guess was William Oliver and the jar was given to him on Christmas Eve. Thank you to everyone who took part.
Emma
Emma has recently been selected by Durham Scouts for the opportunity of a lifetime – to attend the 25th World Jamboree in Korea 2023. In order to attend Emma has to raise a lot of money and is busy with lots of fundraising efforts. Alongside the cake sale Emma intended to do the Boxing Day Dip, but unfortunately huge waves on the day cancelled that dip. But not deterred Emma took a friend along to Redcar a couple of days later when the weather had calmed for their own boxing day dip. Emma reported it was FREEZING!
If you wish to follow Emma’s fundraising efforts or help support her please follow this link: https://www.gofundme.com/f/scouts-25th-world-jamboree-in-korea
Congratulations to Harry Whitfield (A1 squad) and April Mansfield (A2 squad) who have been selected to be part of the Northumberland and Durham County Swimming Camp 2021.
The camp forms part of the Northumberland and Durham Development Programme and will provide an opportunity for swimmers to develop their technical, tactical, physical and psychological skills with swimmers of a similar age and ability from across the county. The camp will also provide an opportunity for swimmers to work with different coaches and to train in a different environment.
Because of the pandemic, the programme was unable to run the face to face camp in 2021, therefore this camp will engage with athletes in the 11 year old age group where age is defined as at 31st December 2021. This will ensure that the athletes from this age group haven’t missed out on a training opportunity in 2021.
The course will run for one day at the end of January 2022. The syllabus for this camp has been prescribed by the nationally focused England Programmes team to ensure a seamless development pathway within the sport. Across the day, swimmers will undertake both technical work in the pool, a ‘swim specific’ dryland workshop as well as a number of educational workshops.
Good Luck swimmers and enjoy your day.
Laura Burgess achieved her first two National qualifying times this term and competed in the National Winter Championships (Short Course) at Ponds Forge International Sports Centre in Sheffield over the weekend of 3-5 December. There were so many entries to the Championships that the gala organisers had to split the 50m pool into two 25m pools and use one for Male events and the other for Female events.
Laura stepped up very well to the challenge of competing at this high-level meet for the first time and nerves certainly didn’t get the better of her.
In the 100m Freestyle heats on Friday afternoon, she swam 58.61, just 0.01 seconds outside her personal best. In the last 6 months all 7 times at this event she has recorded sub-60 seconds. Laura finished 106th out of 165 swimmers and 38th in the 16yrs and under.
In the 50m Freestyle heats on Saturday morning, she won her heat in a personal best time of 26.89, setting her third PB in this event in less than 6 weeks. Laura finished 57th out of 152 swimmers and 20th in the 16yrs and under!
We had a great weekend at Nationals, the venue was packed with elite swimmers and Laura did not let the occasion faze her. She swam two great races and represented herself and DASC so well. To come away with 57th place Nationally and 20th in the Juniors is incredible. Well done.
Comment from DASC Head Coach Lucy Procter
Report compiled by Jane Teague
Well done to all swimmers who took part in the Festive Derwentside gala on 4th/5th December some great times achieved and lots of PBs. Below is the full results.
DASC held its first club gala since February 2020, with swimmers age 9 & over from all squads invited to take part. Medals were received by the top 3 swimmers in each age group and there were club gala trophies awarded for some of the events. There were some fantastic times achieved and, with some great first swims from our novice swimmers, it was a fabulous evening! Well done to everyone who took part.
Although the gala licence was granted for awards at age on 31st December 2021, we have held club gala records for many years achieved on the actual club gala date, so we have continued with that practice. Congratulations go to the following:
Boys 11&12 years 50m Butterfly – Alexander Morton, A1 Squad – 30.74
Girls 11&12 years 200m Freestyle – Lucy Oliver, Top Squad – 2:15.40
Boys 13&14 years 200m Freestyle – Alex Boyer, Top Squad – 2:10.89
And, not forgetting Lewis Kestle who exactly equalled the Boys 13&14 years 50m Butterfly time of 30.53 to 0.01 seconds standing since 2013. Unfortunately, Lewis’s name will not appear on the records.
It was the first time that one of our internal galas has been licensed by SE (at level 4), meaning that times will appear on the SE database. This was made possible by the willingness of qualified referees from RDASC to officiate at the gala, along with DASC’s own qualified gala officials.
DASC also very much appreciates the technical support given in the poolside office and on poolside by Ian Proud, the Dolphin Centre staff for the gala set-up, DASC coaches and poolside volunteers, and especially to Carol Bottomley, the gala organiser. The gala ran smoothly and it was great to be back racing, even if we were unable to admit spectators onto poolside for it.
If your swimmer did not enter this time, we would strongly encourage them to do so next time we hold a club gala. If you would like to find out more about becoming an official or about any of the voluntary roles within the Club speak to your squad coach or ask at the Club desk to be signposted to the right person.
Report by Carol Bottomley and Jane Teague
As from Monday 29th November there are some changes to Morning training for A1 and A2 squads.
Changes are as follows:
| Mon AM | 6.30 – 7.30 | Dolphin Centre | Top |
| Tue AM | 6.30 – 7.30 | Dolphin Centre | Top |
| 6.30 – 7.30 | Dolphin Centre | A1 and A2 | |
| Thu AM | 6.30 – 7.30 | Dolphin Centre | Top and A1 |
| Fri AM | 6.30 – 7.30 | Dolphin Centre | Top |
| 6.30 – 7.30 | Dolphin Centre | A1 and A2 |
Any questions, please speak to your squad coach.
The Swim England North-East Region Short Course Championships, commonly known as NERs, were held at Ponds Forge International Sports Centre in Sheffield on 6&7 November 2021. The 50m pool was split into two halves and the Open and Age Group events ran concurrently.
DASC had 19 swimmers from Top, A1 and A2 squads, who qualified in a total of 80 events. 17 of these took part in 64 different events over the course of the weekend. Head Coach Lucy Proctor and A2 squad coach Allison Matthias were poolside for the weekend, and Carol Bottomley represented the club as a technical official.
Because of the pandemic, the NER Championships have not been held since November 2019, so this is the first opportunity to compete at this level for 2 years.
It was great to see so many PB swims achieved during the weekend, especially given that many of these swimmers have just competed in several recent local galas, setting PBs in them.
This year the Open Championships were for Boys age 15&Over and Girls age 14&Over. It is a big step up from the age group to the open competition just to make the qualifying times. Heats of events were swum in the morning sessions and finals in the afternoon sessions, except for 800m and 1500m Freestyle.
6 Top Squad swimmers competed in 20 events and recorded a great total of 14 PB swims.
Laura Burgess at age 15 qualified for the final of the 50m Freestyle, finishing 9th, with the fastest 15&Under time in this event at the Championships. She also did PB swims in 200m Freestyle and 50m Butterfly. Laura has qualified to swim in the Winter National Championships in December on 50m and 100m Freestyle, and we wish her well as she steps up to competing at National level.
Harvey Matthias (17) had a busy weekend with 6 events in 2 sessions, producing PBs in 4 of them, breaking the 30 second barrier for 50m Backstroke for the first time. James McLeary (16) did his best ever times in 200m and 400m Individual Medley and 100m Breaststroke. Emily Burrell (15) continued her recent run of improvements to her 50m Freestyle time.14-year-olds Niamh Kay and Ruby Diment coped well in the Open events for the first time, competing against some swimmers many years older than them. Niamh swam PBs on 50m and 100m Breaststroke, finishing as the 3rd fastest 14-year-old on the 50m. Ruby swam all the Backstroke events, finishing 2nd fastest and 3rd fastest 14-year-old on the 100m and 50m events respectively.
See SENER Open Championships (25m) 2021 for full results.
All the Age Group events were HDW (Heat Declared Winner), enabling swimmers to compete in multiple events over the weekend. DASC was represented by 11 youngsters in 45 events, recording 32 PB swims. They also won 4 medals and there were 11 other Top Ten placings. This was the first time that several of them had been eligible to compete at NER level, either because they have just reached the minimum age (11) to compete in it, or because they have just made the breakthrough to achieve the required qualifying times, or because the pandemic has denied them previous opportunities.
Lucy Oliver (12) had a very busy and successful weekend with 7 PBs in her 8 swims. She began with a bronze in the 200m Freestyle which was a very tight race, won silver on 100m Freestyle, and saved the best to near the end of the last session with a gold medal to become the 50m Freestyle NER Champion. She narrowly missed out on a medal in the 400m Freestyle and gained 3 other Top Ten finishes on Backstroke and Butterfly events. It was a fantastic weekend’s swimming for Lucy.
Our other medallist was Alex Boyer (14) in the 1500m Freestyle event where he came 3rd; he also produced a PB swim on 200m Freestyle.
DASC had a trio of 11-year-olds making their NER debut. Harry Whitfield was another busy and successful DASC swimmer – 7 PBs in 7 events, on all strokes except Breaststroke, with 6 Top Ten placings, including two 4th places. What a great start to competing at NER level. Ben Burrell did very well to swim 3 PBs on 3 50m sprint events and April Mansfield also produced 3 excellent PBs in her 4 events.
Our more experienced NER competitors know what to expect at this level. Hugo Douglas-Reeves (13) produced PBs in all 3 Breaststroke events powering under the 3-minute barrier on 200m and gaining a Top Ten place on 100m. Ben Matthias (13) swam a PB on 50m Backstroke, Alex Morton (13) swam PBs in both his events, and Lewis Kestle(14) swam in 6 events with 3 PBs to show for his hard work.
Our older first-time NER qualifiers gained great experience at this level. Zara Jones (13) swam PBs on 200m Freestyle and Backstroke and Chiara Valgolio (13) came close to recently set PBs on her 2 events.
See SENER Age Group Championships (25m) 2021 for full results
“It was great to see our swimmers represent DASC so well across the two Championships. We had experienced athletes and first-timers who performed at their best in such a high level meet. Overall, results were superb and an Open final and four Age Group medals topped off a fantastic weekend.”
Head Coach Lucy Procter
