The Ards Blair Mayne Wellbeing and Leisure Complex set the perfect location for Larne to compete in their Division 3B Aquasprint Final against Lecale and Olympia Swimming Club.
Larne could not have started better, achieving 1st place points for all Medley Relay events.
This pathed the way for excellent performances in the individual events with Larne earning 77 points on Backstroke, 65 points on Breaststroke, 71 points on Butterfly and 69 points on Freestyle.
Larne finished the event the same way as they started – achieving 1st place points for all Freestyle Relay events.
The Aquasprint Final concluded with the final scores being 190 points to Olympia, 280 points to Lecale and 370 points to Larne.
A massive congratulations to all swimmers from all 3 clubs and a special thank youto all of the organisers and volunteers for their commitment.
Banbridge at South Lakes was the host for the last long course gala before Division 2 and Division 1 summer nationals. This was the last chance for swimmers across our squads to obtain qualification times. As expected this gala was over subscribed and very busy.
In the Development Squad, Marco Allen, Alex Rea, Alexander Murphy, and Ethan Smyth had fantastic swims, lots of PB’s, very good racing skills on display. Marco obtained an additional Division 2 swim, followed with a 3rd place medal in the 50 Breaststroke.
Not to be outdone, Annabella Cole, Megan O’Mahony and Olivia Beggs swam some amazing races against much older, experienced competition. There were PB’s across the board, with Annabella Cole taking 1st in the 50m Breaststroke and 2nd in the 50m Butterfly.
Our Junior National and Senior Sqaud swimmers were at the event to hone their racing skills, and to obtain additional swims at the summer nationals.
For the Junior National swimmers, Asha McIlroy, Eve McKeown and Owen Wasnidge all swam well with Asha getting a PB in the 50m Breaststroke.
In the National Sqaud, Sophie Doran, Grace Coyle, Daniel Beggs, Maya Niblock and Charlie Morriss were very strong across a number of events. Sophie posted a PB in the 100m Freestyle, followed by Daniel Beggs in the same event. Charlie Morriss, placed 1st in the 100 Freestyle and 3rd in the 50m Breaststroke both with PB’s.
Well done to all swimmers, we now look forward to supporting our swimmers at European Juniors, Commonwealth and European Games, and Irish Summer Nationals.
So at long last, after a trials meet in April, the commonwealth council NI has announced the aquatics team for Birmingham 2022.
An aquatics team of 11 has been selected to represent Northern Ireland
SWIMMERS Danielle Hill Daniel Wiffen Jack McMillan Victoria Catterson Grace Davison Kaitlin McCaw Mollie McAlorum
PARA SWIMMERS Bethany Firth Barry McClements Siomha Nic Bradaigh
DIVER Tanya Watson
3 #teamlarne athletes have been selected as part of this team
Danielle Hill & Daniel Wiffen were preselected having represented Ireland at the Tokyo Olympics however both achieved the Qualifying standard set for selection to the Commonwealth team at various meets in this cycle anyway.
Danielle is a fantastic ambassador for not only our squad in Larne but also our sport in Ireland. She is testament to the adage hard work pays off. If you surround yourself with the right people, trust the process and dare to dream you can achieve anything.
Daniels career has been on an upward trajectory over the last 2 years and his move to Loughborough has paid off massively with an incredible series of swims since qualifying for Tokyo.
Danielle will contest 50/100 free 50/100 back 50 flyDaniel will contest 1500 free 400 free
Kaitlyn McCaw was selected as the 3rd girl on the 4 x 100 freestyle relay.
Having taken a hiatus from the sport to concentrate on studies Kaitlyn has shown that swimming into your twenties can and should be a rewarding experience. A great message to all younger swimmers.
Kaitlyn will contest 50/100 fly 4*100 free
These three will join Oliver Gunning on the team after Oliver was confirmed as part of the para triathlete team
Oliver will contest para triathlon
Having 4 athletes on the team from a small club is a fantastic achievement for all involved but even more important, 3 out of those 4 swim IN OUR PROGRAM every single day.
Congratulations to all who have shown that with hard work the right environment and the support of a strong squad you can achieve all you wish within a club program
Well done all we cannot wait to watch you all race this summer
Larne kicked off their third Aquasprint of the season against Olympia Swimming Club at the Falls Road Leisure Centre in the blistering sunshine.
The absence of diving blocks certainly did not affect the performance of the swimmers, with the final scores being 170 to Olympia and 230 to Larne!
A massive congratulations to all swimmers who swam their hearts out and had great fun. It is very pleasing to see a fantastic team spirit surrounding the entire group.
A special thank you to Olympia Swimming Club for being terrific hosts, as well as all the volunteers for their commitment to running a successful event.
After the under 13s last weekend, it was the tunr of the senior club to get back to some racing this weekend.
#Teamlarne turned up in Lisburn with 29 swimmers contesting 95 individual and 15 relays. This series of meets is a re-brand of the qualifying meets from BC (before covid). The addition of the sprint relays added to the atmosphere and we await the results from the points scoring system borrowed from the ISL to see how we fared as a club.
For the senior club this meet fell in the middle of week 9 of the cycle, a 7th 40000+ week, and was used as part of the weeks training with no regen or rest.
The results file is attached below so I wont go through the results here other than to highlight a few key points of note.
Of the 110 individual times posted 65% were PBs, 20% were new times.
Congratulations to Pheobe, Kate, Mia, Oliver and Owen who were racing at this level for the 1st time and did a great job.
Thomas Leggett deserves a special mention for his 100 Free winning in a time of 52.4 as does Evan Coulter for his 1st sub 60 100 IM.
Morgan Berryman competing for Larne for the 1st time raced 11 times (a 25 for every year of his life 😁 he is very Oooooold)
Aspiring to Inspire
Ele Donegan recorded her 1st Club record in the 200 Fly.
The relays were dominant across all events and point to a very exciting future for our club as we move towards the Ulsters and Irish with 4 more swimmers to add to this pool.
This meet was also a 1st for Paul Morriss and Danielle for Larne in a coaching capacity and it was great to have some company on poolside for a change.
Most significant was the obvious joy we displayed just being able to race again as a team, our support for each other (by far the most vocal on the day) was exceptional and as the head coach was great to see.
The day finished with the club having 24 qualifiers for Ulsters and 17 for Irish SC.
TeamLarne 