A week after their first gala of the season at Middlesbrough, Sedgefield 75 swimmers headed to the Dolphin Centre for the 2019 Darlington Dander Gala. A combined total of 73 swims were completed by 14 young swimmers who earned an impressive 31 medals for finishing in the top three in their respective age groups.
Ellis Dickinson swam superbly in his first ever competition and achieved his target of under a minute for his freestyle race, and Iona Darnton representing Sedgefield for the first time in competition swam in three events including a particularly impressive 50m freestyle performance.
Pippa Sanderson swam personal best times in both of her races and Oliver Turnbull returned with five out of six personal bests including a five-second improvement at 100m Individual Medley which earned him a silver medal to go with his three bronze medals.
Liam Hughes received two bronze medals to go with three PBs from his five races. Matthew Wimbury won breaststroke silver and bronze medals over 100m and 50m.
The Wilczynski brothers Mateusz and Filip again racked up another big haul of medals, Filip taking home six gold medals and 3 PBs from nine events and Mateusz a gold and two bronze.
Zoe Hodgson competed in five races, smashing her 50m backstroke PB and Charlie McEwan took a silver and a PB at 50m butterfly and two other bronze medals. Chloe Harding hit three personal best time in seven events and James Hodgson swam four races taking silver at 50m freestyle.
Emma Price and Tom Curran both achieved medals in all five of their races, Emma winning four golds and a silver and Tom two golds and three silver. Both swimmers “PB’d” in two events and Emma had the distinction of finishing fourth across all age-groups (70 swimmers up to 17 years old) in the 100m individual medley despite being just 11 years old herself.
All swimmers once again conducted themselves excellently and came together as a team to provide plenty of vocal support to their competing team-mates. Lots more hard work in training now before the club heads to Chester-le-Street to test themselves again!
