Bishop's Stortford Swimming Club
Affiliated to Swim England East Region
Congratulations to all our swimmers who have qualified for this year’s British Swimming Championships! BSSC action kicks off on Weds 5th April with our youngest qualifier, 15 year old Ella Greatbatch, competing in the 200m Breaststroke. Good luck everyone.
The FINA Masters rankings for 2022 have just been published and three BSSC swimmers have achieved swims that feature in the World Top 10 fastest lists!
Alyson Fordham, competing in the 65-69 year old category, had a fantastic year achieving the 2nd fastest swim in the world in 2022 in the 50m and 200m Freestyle events, 3rd fastest for the 100m Freestyle and 100m IM, 5th in the 50m Backstroke and 7th for 400m Freestyle all in the short course (25m pool) format. In the long course (50m pool) format, she was 2nd fastest in the 50m Freestyle, 4th in the 100m freestyle and 10th in the 400m Freestyle.
Elizabeth Bellinger (40-45yrs) and Sally Winter (60-65yrs) also got into the 2022 top 10 rankings for short course events, with Lizzie being the 5th fastest competitor in the world in the 100m Butterfly and Sally the 7th fastest in the 200m Freestyle and 10th in the 100m Freestyle.
Alyson’s times from the 2022 season also propelled her into the top 10 fastest swims of all time for six events (four short course and two long course), with four of the times being new European records. By the end of 2022, she held both European records for 50m Freestyle and had the 4th fastest ever short course (25m) swim and the 7th long course (50m). Her other two European Records were in the SC 200m Freestyle and the SC 100m IM where she ranked 4th and 5th in the world all time rankings respectively. Finally, in the 100m Freestyle she has the 7th fastest SC and 9th fastest LC swims.
2023 has started well for all three swimmers (see previous News articles) and we send huge good luck wishes to them all for the rest of the season.
65-69yrs Alyson Fordham
65-69yrs Alyson Fordham
65-69yrs Alyson Fordham
40-45yrs Elizabeth Bellinger
60-64yrs Sally Winter
65-69yrs Alyson Fordham
The 2023 Swim Wales Masters Long Course Championships were held the weekend after St David’s Day at the Wales National Pool in Swansea, and regular BSSC competitor Lizzie Bellinger was in Golden form beating two Swim England East Region records that had stood since 2016. Competing in the 45-49yr old age group for the first time she took Gold in the 200m IM (2:42.50 East Region record), Gold in the 50m Fly (31.01) and Silver in the 100m Freestyle (1:05.20 East Region record). Lizzie unfortunately had to withdraw from the 100m Fly due to illness, but this was a great golden start to the 2023 season.
Two BSSC Masters swimmers recently travelled to Crawley for the Swim England South East Region Masters Open Long Course Competition and both were on record breaking form.
Alyson Fordham achieved a trio of golden freestyle events in the 65/69 year category, breaking her own 200m freestyle BRITISH record in a time of 2:39.54 and achieving South East Region (SER) meet best performances in the 50m freestyle (31.19) and 100m freestyle (1:10.99). In the shorter distances she was the 8th (100m) and 11th (50m) female across all age groups from 18+!
Sally Winter competed in the 60/64 year category and took gold in the 100m freestyle (1:11.35, 9th fastest female overall), gold and an East Region record in the 800m freestyle (11:46.24) and silver in the 50m backstroke (41.67).
Congratulations to them both! We’re looking forward to reporting on many more successes from these two during the rest of this 2022/23 season.
Ten members of Bishop’s Stortford Swimming Club’s Masters squad were recently selected to represent Hertfordshire, in the Swim England National Masters Inter-County Competition. Held across six nationwide events with all 33 English Counties competing for the first time in the 22 year history of the event, the results were amalgamated into a National league table and Hertfordshire came a very respectable 14th in an event won by Devon.
At each Regional event swimmers competed in 50m backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly and freestyle for women and men in age groups 18 plus, 25 plus, 35 plus, 45 plus, 55 plus, 65 plus and 50m freestyle for age group 75 plus. Relays (one team per county) were 4 x 50m medley and freestyle for women and men for combined age groups 72 plus, 100 plus, 140 plus, 180 plus, 220 plus and mixed (two women and two men) 4 x 50m mixed medley and freestyle for age group 260 plus.
All swimmers contributed to the great final position of Hertfordshire but the achievements of Alyson Fordham swimming in the 65 plus age group are definite highlights. Alyson dominated the field in two of her events, coming 1st in the 50m freestyle (32.32) and 50m backstroke (39.37) and she also came 4th in the amalgamated results in the 50m breaststroke (44.39) and 50m butterfly (37.66). Youngsters Callum Davis and Niamh James achieved top ten English finishes in their 18 plus races too: Niamh 6th in the 50m backstroke (32.22) and Callum 7th in 50m butterfly (26.74)
Ex Stortford coach Barry Chandler swam for Suffolk (24th overall) coming 2nd in the 50m butterfly (32.12) and 3rd in the 50m freestyle (30.05).
Full individual BSSC (old and current!) Swim England amalgamated results :
BSSC Masters: Alyson Fordham, Aoife James, Callum Davis, Dan Chada, Helen Shingler, Jake Lloyd, Joe Collins, Lizzie Bellinger, Niamh James, Sally Winter and
Ex-BSSC Masters: Anne Vanner (Suffolk), Barry Chandler (Suffolk)
