The Leisure Centre is to undergo a £1.4M refit over the next few months and as per the announcement in the Gainsborough Standard recently this work ‘started’ on the 4th June.
We have had several meetings with the LC Management who assure us that this initial work is surveying for asbestos and the like and will not affect our access to the pool.
The final schedule of works has yet to be agreed but the indications are that work on the pool area and changing village is planned for August and mainly evenings to minimise direct disruption to us.
Obviously when work does start in other areas there will be some inconvenience but this will be kept to a minimum.
We will keep in regular contact with the LC Management and update you as and when necessary.
George Jackson won England Talent Athlete of the Year Award for Water Polo for his impressive performances in 2016 and 2017.
Jackson is a member of Rotherham Metro Water Polo club. During the last season he helped his club to secure promotion in the National League. At just 14 years old, he impressed with his skills as an outfield player, as well as being Rotherham’s number one goalkeeper.
Jackson said: “It’s amazing to achieve such an award for playing a sport I love. We’ve played at National Age Groups this year which we won, and then U16s Inter-Regionals last month which we came third in. But I got MVP. It’s a team sport and it’s so great to win with your team.”
Great News! The club has achieved Swim 21 accreditation on our first submission.
We started the process in January and set ourselves a tight schedule but at the recent East Midland review panel our submission was reviewed and approved, we should get it rubber-stamped by the National panel next week when our certificate will be issued. A big thank you to Fiona Martin and Paula Osborne for sorting out what documents and forms were needed, checking and uploading them. Well done to everyone who supported them, especially Mark, Julie and Clare for their support in providing information and completing forms etc.
A sincere thank you to Sue Paget from East Midlands ASA for her patience and enthusiastic support through-out the process.
Lincs Counties 2016 Grantham
This was the first counties since the announcement by the ASA to move the qualification age to ‘age at end of 31st December’ and although we were expecting a drop in the number of people qualifying this did not happen, with Gainsborough taking a total of 27 swimmers to both Grantham and Louth.
The first weekend was held out Grantham and with the help of Mark Smith, Chris Webster, Tony Bindon and Kate Jackson the swimmers had a good start to the counties taking home a total of 30 medals, including finals. However I am sure that the coaching staff did not think the day would turn out as it did as in the first race, the 200mtr Freestyle, Amelia Osborne had a DQ for a false start having followed another 2 swimmers who went before the beep. Emma Jackson, Lydia Smith & Elliss Worboys completed the line-up for this race with Emma finishing a respectable 5th with a 6 second PB. The Boys 200mtr Breaststroke was the following race for both Brandon Smith and Joshua Goodman and both boys raced well, with Josh finishing 4th and Brandon taking silver with a near 10 second PB.
It was the Girls turn to prepare for the 100mtr IM with a total of 7 girls competing in this event. As well as the aforementioned girls above Lucie Blades, Leah Smith and Rebecca Franks completed the line-up for this event. Amelia was the first to take the starting blocks for this event and was surprisingly fresh from the lack of previous racing. As such she finished her heat 1st and came away with silver from the final. Emma and Lydia were the next to step up with Emma finishing 9th and Lydia 2nd in her heat and a bronze from the final. It was good to see Lydia taking her first medals from this year’s counties following the many fourths from last year. Lucie swam a good race and earned herself a 2 second PB whilst Elliss also helped herself to a 0.5 sec PB.
Back to the boys with the 100mtr Fly with Aaron Smith, Will Walmsley and Jack Boulton competing alongside Brandon and Josh in this event. Brandon and Josh were the first to race for the Dolphins with both performing well in the heats with Josh finishing 3rd and Brandon taking 1st place. Then it was the turn of the 16yr olds + and much to the surprise of everyone watching Aaron’s heat was the first of this group, followed closely by both Will and Jack. Once all the heats were completed Aaron finished 3rd with a 1 sec PB and Will also posted a 0.5 sec PB. During the respective finals for this event, again Brandon finished 1st, however John posted an improvement and came 2nd closely behind him. Aaron finished 4th in the final just a little behind his time he posted in the heat but still a PB on his entry time.
The morning session ended with the girls 50mtr Backstroke which overall had the most entries from the Dolphins on the day. This race saw the addition of Lydia Tomlinson, Katie Bindon, Emily Lobley and Sophie Grierson. Of the 11 girls swimming in this event there were a total of 6 PB’s completed by Emma, Lydia Tomlinson, Lydia Smith, Lucie, Katie and Emily. Both Lydia Smith and Katie made it through to the finals by finishing 1st and 7th in their heats respectively. Lydia secured gold in the final to bring her medal tally in the morning to 4 whilst Katie finished in 8th with both improving on the times that got them to the final.
The afternoon session began again with the 200mtr Freestyle, however this time for the boys. In this race Gainsborough had Brandon, Josh and Jack competing. The 12 yr age group race saw both Brandon and Josh in the same race with Brandon fighting it out at the front whilst Josh had his own fight with the others. Brandon was narrowly pipped into 2nd and the same thing happened to Josh with an unlucky 4th with both posting PB’s. The only entry into the girls 200mtr Breaststroke was Lydia Smith who swam well and finished with a 7 sec PB.
Next up was the boys 100 IM with the additions of both Reuben Gidlow and James Smith. Brandon and Josh again competing against each other with Brandon coming 1st again and Josh improving on his last race, this time coming 3rd to get them both to the final and for the positions to stay the same. In the 13yr old race Reuben finished a good 2nd place with a 1.5 sec PB and then improving on his time in the final to record a final 2.5 sec PB with a silver medal. The over 16 age group saw Aaron, James, Will and Jack competing. Aaron eventually finished 1st in the heats but was unlucky to come 3rd in the final which also saw James finishing closely behind in 5th position. To their credit though, all of the boys competing recorded PB’s from their original seeded times.
The girls had to then compete in the 100mtr Fly for which Emily Neil had also qualified. Amelia was the first in the water and finished 1st in both her heat and the final with a 9 sec PB recorded. PB’s were also recorded by Lydia Smith, Emily, Elliss and Becci.
The final event of the first day saw the boys competing in the 50mtr Backstroke and included both George Jackson and Cammron Bower. It was the usual suspects and the usual results for the 12 & 13yr old boys with entries from Brandon, Josh and Reuben. Again Brandon and Josh finished in 1st and 3rd respectively to get to the final where again Brandon achieved gold and Josh was unlucky to be pushed into 4th place. Reuben swam a good race with PB’s in both the heat and the final, finishing both in 3rd place. The only other finalist was Aaron who finished 2nd in his heat but then dropped a place in the final to finish 3rd just missing a PB on both occasions. George, Will and Cammron all swam well with both Will and Cammron getting PB’s and George narrowly missing out.
The only other event of the weekends swimming at Grantham was the 400mtr Freestyle for which our only entry was Emma Jackson. Kate did not want Emma to miss this event at all so turned up around midday for a 2pm warm up despite being notified of the change the day before ( ). However the wait must have done Emma good as she smashed her PB by an 18 sec margin to finish 5th overall.
The final medal count of the first weekends racing was Amelia Osborne (4), Lydia Smith (4), Brandon Smith (8), Josh Goodman (5), Rueben Gidlow (4) & Aaron Smith (5).
Louth
The second weekend of the counties was held at Louth with even more swimmers competing at Louth than at Grantham. The first event of the weekend was the 200mre IM with both Amelia Osborne and Rebecca Franks competing. Amelia swam a good race coming second with a 16 sec PB. This was followed by the boys 100mtr Breaststroke with the entries for this event being dominated by Smiths. Brandon, James and Aaron all swam this event with Brandon finishing 2nd in the heat with a 3.5 sec PB to make it to the final along with both James and Aaron who finished 5th and 7th respectively, both close to PB’s.
The second event for the girls was the 50mtr Freestyle with Amelia, Emma Jackson, Lydia Smith, Elliss Worboys, Leah Smith and Becci all competing. This event saw two of the girls make it into the final Amelia and Lydia, by coming 3rd and 6th. Elliss, Leah and Becci all swam a good race coming close to their PB’s. In the final Amelia came 3rd and Lydia 4th, both PB’ing and improving on their qualification times in the heats. The only other mention in the 50mtr Free must go to Emma who was unfortunately DQ’d having been eager to do well was a little too eager and left the blocks that little too early.
The boys were up next with the 200mtr Backstroke with Brandon and Aaron being joined by Reuben Gidlow. All 3 swam well with both Brandon and Reuben getting medals coming 1st and 3rd and both achieving PB’s into the mix. To start the afternoon session off it was Brandon’s turn to compete in the 200mtr IM and he came away with yet another gold along with another 2.5 sec PB.
The girls were to swim the 100mtr Breaststroke and in this event the Dolphins were represented by Amelia, Emma, Lydia Smith, Sian Saunders, Lydia Waring and Becci. This event proved to be a good event for the girls with 5 of the girls getting PB’s and Amelia, Emma and Lydia making it into the final with finished of 1st, 4th and 2nd. In the final they came 2nd, 4th and 2nd.
Next to swim were the boys in the 50mtr Freestyle with Brandon, Reuben, George Jackson, Aaron, James, Jack Boulton and Will Walmsley competing. Three swimmers made it to the final, Brandon, Reuben and Aaron who finished 1st, 3rd and 2nd in their heats, all 3 posting PB’s. The other swimmers posting PB’s in this event were George and Will who both swam well. In the final both Brandon and Reuben finished where they did in the heats, 1st and 3rd and it was unfortunate that Aaron slipped out of the medals finishing 4th. The final race of the day was the girls 200mtr Backstroke which had Emma, Lydia, Lucie Blades and Becci competing. All 4 girls swam a good race with all of them PB’ing and Emma finishing the highest in 8th place.
The final day of this year’s counties started with the 200mtr Fly with Amelia being the only girl competing for the Dolphins. She swam an excellent race to finish 2nd but posting a 31 sec PB. This was followed by the boys 100mtr Backstroke which saw Harvey Stevens joining Brandon, Reuben and Aaron. All swam well and made it into their respective finals by finishing 5th, 2nd, 3rd and 1st and all posting PB’s with Harvey excelling posting close to a 5.5 sec PB. The finals saw Harvey improving on his performance in the heat finishing 4th, Reuben finishing 3rd although posting an even quicker time than the one recorded in the heat and Aaron dropped to 2nd. Brandon, even though winning the final by approx. 5 seconds was DQ’d as he felt he could finish quicker finishing like a submarine without its periscope deployed.
The girls 50mtr Fly was the next race with Amelia, Emma, Lydia Smith, Harriet Webster, Katie Bindon, Elliss, Leah Smith and Sophie Grierson all competing. This event saw Amelia (1st), Emma (8th), Lydia (3rd), Katie (8th) and Ellis (6th) all make it through to the final. The remaining girls all PB’d with the following Harriet (0.99), Leah (1.42), Sophie (0.06). In the final Amelia and Lydia both got medals coming 2nd and 3rd whilst the others finished a respectable Emma (8th), Katie (7th) and Elliss (7th).
The boys 50mtr Breaststroke saw Brandon, George Jackson, Ben Ambrose, James Smith, Aaron and Will competing. Brandon, Ben, James and Aaron all made it into the finals finishing 1st, 7th, 1st and 6th in their heats and all swimming PB’s. George, although not making it into the final still posted a 12 sec PB and Will posted a 1.5 sec PB. The final saw Brandon finish 2nd, Ben 7th, James 1st and Aaron 7th.
The final race of the morning session saw the girls competing the 100mtr Freestyle. This event had Amelia, Emma, Lydia, Lucie Blades, Elliss and Becci competing. 3 of the girls made it into the final, Amelia, Emma and Elliss who finished 2nd, 3rd and 8th in their heats and Lydia just missed out finishing 9th. In the final Amelia finished 7th, one race too far in the morning session, Emma was pipped into 4th place on the final touch and Elliss finished 7th.
The afternoon session was the 200mtr Fly which again saw only swimmer from Gainsborough competing, Will Walmsley. Will swam a superb race finishing 8th and posting a 5 sec PB. The girls 100mtr Backstroke followed this with Amelia, Emma, Lydia, Lucie, Elliss and Becci all competing. 3 of the girls, Amelia, Emma and Lydia made it into the final by finishing 7th, 3rd and 2nd and all posting PB’s. Lucie and Elliss also posted PB’s for this event, 4.33 and 0.36 respectively. In the final all 3 girls did not improve on their finishing positions from the heats by coming home 7th, 3rd and 2nd again with both Emma and Lydia improving on their PB’s achieved in the heats.
It was the boys turn for the 50mtr Fly and this event had Harvey Stevens, Brandon, Reuben, Aaron, Jack and Will competing with Harvey, Brandon, Reuben and Aaron making it into the final finishing 8th, 1st, 3rd and 1st in the heats, with all bar Aaron swimming PB’s. In the final Harvey finished 8th, Brandon 1st, improving on his PB from the heat, Reuben 3rd and Aaron 2nd.
The final event of the weekend for the girls saw them competing in the 50mtr Breaststroke. Amelia, Emma, Lydia Smith, Sian, Katie, Leah and Becci were joined by Hannah Lonsdale and Lydia Waring. Of the 9 girls competing 5 of them made it into the final, Amelia, Emma, Lydia, Katie and Sian by finishing 1st, 4th, 2nd, 7th and 8th in their heats and all posting PB’s. Leah, Hannah and Lydia Waring also posted PB’s in their heats. The final saw Amelia finish 1st, Emma 4th, Lydia 2nd, Katie 7th and Sian 8th with both Amelia and Lydia improving on their heat times.
The final race of the counties was the boys 100mtr Freestyle which saw Brandon, Reuben, Aaron, Jack and Will competing. Aaron was unfortunate to miss out on the finals, however both Brandon and Reuben did get through finishing 1st and 3rd in their heats with Reuben posting a PB along the way. The final placings for both swimmers did not change from their heats with Brandon taking his final gold of the counties and Reuben finishing 3rd, improving on his time from the heats.
The final medal count from the second weekend of racing at Louth was Amelia (11), Emma (4), Lydia Smith (8), Brandon (13), Reuben (9), Aaron (5) and James (2). Overall the Dolphins swimmers amassed an excellent 82 medals between them made up of 28 Golds, 27 Silver and 27 Bronze.
All together this was by far and away an exceptional performance by all involved with the club and shows that the hard work and dedication that the swimmers put in pays off. To top it all off as things stand at present we have managed to get 13 swimmers to the Regionals at both Corby and Ponds Forge, the most that we have ever managed to achieve.
I am pleased to announce that Mark ‘Banger’ Smith will be taking up the role of Swim Manager from 1st February 2016.
Mark is taking up the position on an un-paid, voluntary basis and the club thanks him for this.
I have covered the role over the last year with the support of Mark and now with the support of myself, the senior teachers/coaches and Management Team, Mark will take on full responsibility for the teaching/coaching of swimming within the club including the small pool, main pool teaching, competitive coaching and the Masters, and will retain responsibility with Mark Smith for the club champs.
Mark has been associated with the club for a number of years and he shares the club ethos “All striving to achieve our swimming potential”. He intends to be hands on, teaching and coaching when his work shift pattern allows and will continue with the review of the squads started last year by the Management Team. He has put forward further plans to enhance the teaching groups as well as coaching of the competitive swimmers such as set session plans to allow consistency and continuity of coaching along with a regular Parent Forum.
Mark has a good knowledge of the swimming world and this combined with his enthusiasm and support of myself and all teachers and coaches means, the Management Team believe, he will continue the excellent work of the last 4 years and take the club forward in both the teaching and competitive aspects of our swimming.
As part of our continued development as a club we are reviewing each squad against the criteria for the squad with a view to re-aligning swimmers to the correct/most appropriate squad, competitive or otherwise.
This is necessary when we look at the large number of swimmers coming through the small pool, widths and early lengths groups, the small pool waiting list and the number of new swimmers wanting to join us.
Swimmers will be advised of any changes to their squad/nights of swimming in the next three to four weeks.
Can we thank you in advance for you understanding and co- operation.
Nigel Stevenson
Chairman/Acting Swim Manager
Practising what we preach as Club coaches and teachers to show the kids how to do it, 14 masters swimmers represented Gainsborough Dolphins at Grantham Swimming Clubs 90th Anniversary Masters gala on the 29th March. The age ranged from 18 up to the more mature swimmer aged 53 (although this is not the oldest competitive swimmer that represents Gainsborough Dolphins). This event gave Masters debuts to Tonicha Watson, Chris Gillyett and Sarah Ashurst who accompanied Tony Bindon, Rachel Crabtree, Damon Butters, Kate Jackson, Adrian Cawte, James Smith, Steve Morris, Nick Ward-Lowery, Jeanette Morris, Freya Ward-Lowery and Ian Hansford to make up the 14 man squad.
Competing against swimmers from City of Lincoln (combined Pentaqua and Vulcans), Louth, Deepings and Grantham Swimming Club the overall results were:
City of Lincoln
235
Louth
139
Gainsborough Dolphins
116.5
Deepings
111
Grantham
102.5
This was a brilliant result for GD, given we had no swimmers for 14 out of the 44 races (nearly a 1/3 of the overall races) due to the gala falling at the start of the Easter holidays and many swimmers being unavailable.
This all resulted in our swimmers claiming:
5th places
3
4th places
7
3rd places
10
2nd places
3
1st places
6
The final race was a 12×25 mixed club cannon. Each lane had a variety of age swimmers from each club, a good way to socialise and mix with some of swimmers from the other clubs. The winners were rewarded a little trophy of a Cadburys cream egg!!
Not to be out done by the kids who represent Dolphins with their visits to McDonald’s after their galas to celebrate their victories, the masters squad and accompanying supporters celebrated their success with an Indian and a few beverages (of the alcoholic kind – we do have to replace lost fluids after all!).
On the 26th April five of the Club’s master’s swimmers – James Smith, Nick Ward-Lowery, Ian Hansford, Rachel Crabtree and Rosi Fieldson have been selected to swim for Lincolnshire at the Regional Inter-County Masters gala at Braunstone, Leicester. Congratulations and good luck to them all.
Please see below for the decision made by the Lincs ASA County Exec following the recent British Swimming announcement in September regarding the introduction of the ‘Age as at 31st December’ for championship meets :
After a great deal of research, consultation and gathering opinions from members of the Lincs ASA County Champs Sub-Committee members and head coaches of the clubs, regarding the details released in the Swimming Pathway document circulated to all, a decision has been reached by a majority, to keep the 2015 Counties exactly as they are published and have it as age as at last date of competition still, keeping the 9 year olds in the programme and leaving the programme of events as it stands.
The Pathways document states that “Counties are requested to implement the recommendations in 2015, if possible and should make preparations for full implementation in 2016”.
We have not taken this decision not to implement age as at December 31st and the new programme of events for 2015, lightly. All opinions have been taken on board and a majority decision put forward.
At the end of the day, our main concern within Lincs ASA, was to not DISADVANTAGE our youngest swimmers, many of whom have striven really hard since May 1st 2014, to obtain their first main goal in swimming – to get a “County Qualifying Time”. For them to then find that the “Age as at 31st December” date had been implemented and meant that they have not achieved this goal after all, was not something we feel would be best for the swimmers confidence/morale! At the end of the day, we are here for the swimmers and it is the last chance 9 year olds will have to be able to swim in such an event and we don’t feel a change in 2015 is advantageous to these young swimmers.
Also, timescales for pool bookings etc have to be accounted for and if we implement the “Finals”, more time will be required to run the gala’s and pool arrangements and bookings have already been made and costing’s agreed.
I know some of you wanted to change the “Age as at date” and some others wanted changes to the programme made, but after discussions a plenty, including at Regional Meetings/Boards etc, this is what has been decided by majority.
ALL the Pathways Document changes WILL be implemented for 2016 and we will keep everyone informed as best we can throughout this changing time!
Gainsborough Dolphins went into this gala with a few of the regular squad swimmers missing but still produced the results.
33 first places from 46 events was a tremendous effort by the swimmers from all sections of the club. Some of them swimming for the club for a first time along with some seasoned midland swimmers and of course the Masters. Mark Smith would like to thank everyone who competed especially the ones who came in at short notice and did exceptionally well, and the ones who did races they would not normally compete in as its this attitude that improves a club. The mix of these age groups at this gala made for great club team building as some of the young ones got to swim in relays which accounted for the majority of the gala with the senior and masters. These Swimmers representing the club won the gala over all against teams from South Axholme Sharks and Edlington.
The club would also like to thank spectators for their support to both the swimmers and the fund raising on the night for Mr Dunne’s nominated charity.
