South West Open Water Championships 2017

Our championships took place as planned at Weymouth on 24th June. We had a near record number of entries (199), our best for many years. Sadly the generally good weather in June decided to have a day off on this day. Fortunately the water temperature, which had been 19 deg a few days before just reached 16.4 deg but mean the event could take place and wetsuits were mandatory.

There were no issues of note and the day went off successfully

43 SWR age group swimmers qualified for Nationals from our event and of those 39 took part.

Podium success for:

Isabella Woollard, MILLFIELD, 1st F 12 yrs 1.5km

Alexandra Palotai-Avella, BOURNMOUTH COLL, 2nd F 13 yrs 1.5km

Imogen Moroney, WESTON SM, 3rd F 17-18 yrs 5.0km

Our Masters swimmers in 1.5km and 3.0km events amassed 5 1st places, 3 2nd places and 4 3rd places in the various age groups. Special performances by Brian Armstrong and Jonathon Coe of Gloucester Masters who achieved podium places in both the 3.0km and the 1.5km!

SWR contributed 7 officials including Hannah Smith as Technical Director, following in Les Debenham’s footsteps

Some figures for the event

We had a 58% increase in entries with 51 clubs represented from around the Region.

 Event entry statistics: