Masters

A 15-strong team of Bishop’s Stortford swimmers competed for the first time in the Frank Rider charity event hosted by Erith & District Swimming Club on Sunday 15th March. Other teams competing were Saxon Crown SC, Kent Weald SC and two teams from Erith SC.

Many swimmers from BSSC were competing for the first time in 20+ years and for a couple it was their first taste of competitive swimming. We were also delighted to have a few of our senior (18-25yr) swimmers join us in their first taste of Masters swimming. Nerves ran high and during the warm up, the younger swimmers were helping others with race starts and relay take overs.

The event consisted of mainly relay events, including a Butterfly 4 x 50m race and a Backstroke 4 x 50m relay. All were mixed age group so we had 18 year olds swimming with 60 year olds and a 25m race for every age group on all strokes except front crawl. We had 3 joker rounds but sadly only one 1st place – the Mens 18+ (50m) and 60+ (25m) combined backstroke event swam by Callum Davis and Peter Kelleway.

BSSC finished 3rd with 117, 2 points behind Saxon Crown 115 and Erith A just won with 111. (Lowest score wins, with Saxon Crown having a 40 point handicapped head start).

A great evening was had by young and old and all agreed we would be back next year. A total of £289 was raised for Breast Cancer charity.

BSSC Masters competition regular, Elizabeth Bellinger, pulled out of the Febrary Sudbury Masters event with an injury, but although still in recovery, she managed to compete in the Swim Wales Masters Long Course Championships in Swansea over the St David’s Day weekend.

Lizzie took Gold in all four events she entered, bettering her entry times on three events and improving two of the East Region records she already held. Congratulations!

Gold 200m IM (2:39.04)
Gold 50m Fly (PB, 30.17)
Gold 100m Free (PB, 1:04.50)
Gold 100m Fly (PB, 1:07.15)

On 16th Feb, four fabulous BSSC Masters headed to Sudbury for the 25th Valentines Open Meet. David Kelleway (25-29Yrs), Peter Kelleway (60-64Yrs), Helen Shingler (50-54Yrs) and Sally Winter (60-64Yrs) were all in stunning form, taking gold medals in every event they entered and also getting lots of personal best times. Having recently achieved some European Long Course records in her new age group, Sally Winter bagged a short course European Record at Sudbury, taking nearly 3 seconds off the old 200m Free record!! Congratulations to them all.

Results are below:

David Kelleway (25-29Yrs)
Gold in all 5 events
53.50 100m Free
25.25 50m Free
1:02.64 100m Fly
26.74 50m Fly
2:07.35 200m Free

Pete Kelleway (60-64Yrs)
Gold in all 5 events
33.75 50m Back
1:05.63 100m Free
2:46.13 200m IM
1:15.42 100m Back
1:15.26 100m IM

Helen Shingler (50-54Yrs)
Gold 3:04.81 200m IM

Sally Winter (60-64Yrs)
Gold (European Record!) 2:25.83 200m Free

Reaching a milestone birthday can sometimes be advantageous, and BSSC Masters swimmer and Club President, Sally Winter recently proved that point.  January 1^st saw Sally move up into the 60-64 years Masters age group, and at her first 2020 Long Course (50m pool) competition in Crawley on the weekend of 18/19^th January she was in record smashing form.  First up was the 100m Free where she took Gold in a British Masters record time of 1:08.51, more than a second inside the existing British record and only 0.3 seconds outside the European record.  On Sunday she went one better in the 200m Free, smashing the British Masters record by 2.5 seconds and taking the European Masters record by 1 second, in a time of 2:30.78.  Focus for this season now turns to the British Nationals in April and the European Masters Championships in June.  Good luck Sally!