Its been a busy… and successful spring for Hart Swimming Club. April saw the much-anticipated return of the British Championships in Sheffield. Hart Swimmer, Katherine Cairney, competed in the 50m Backstroke achieving a phenomenal time against the best swimmers in the country. Competition was fierce, British Championships see’s most of the current Team GB and many more swimmers hoping to represent their country at the Commonwealth Games competing. Hart’s Katherine had to go up against the likes of backstroke specialist and 2020 Tokyo Olympics gold medalist Kathleen Dawson in an overall thrilling competition.
Hart SC was fortunate to also see representation at the Scottish Masters National Swimming Championships in Glasgow. The Masters competition has competitors that are 18+ yrs old competing for national glory. Hart Swimming Club’s Clive Benson and Tony Clark where in action, leaving Glasgow with 3 silver medals, a Bronze and 9 personal best times in a in a very tough competition which saw World, European, UK and Scottish records being broken in some events.
Hart Swimmers Clive and Michelle also competed in Erith District Masters competition in Kent representing Hart SC, taking home the equivalent of 7 gold medals, 1 silver and 1 bronze, against very hard conditions.
Head Coach Darren Buchan said “Our level of competitiveness and success at the highest points in British Swimming continues to grow. We’re delighted to have had representation at the British Championships once again. We had a few more swimmers who very marginally missed on qualification times but we are confident we will get them there next year.
Our masters’ swimmers continue to push what is possible in the upper age groups of our club. An outstanding achievement for them in Scotland”.
The South East Regional Championships were held over three weekends in May. First weekend at K2@Crawley, second weekend at Wycombe, third weekend back in Crawley. Hart SC took a record number of qualifiers competing across a record number of races for the club! Hart achieved a fantastic haul of medals with Raul D the standout performance for Hart taking a clean sweep of medals in all Backstroke events!
Darren added “The depth and quality of the club continues to grow. Evidenced in this year’s Hampshire County Champs success and followed up by Regional Champs. For the first time in years, we took a balanced squad across all age groups to the Championships with an amazing number of swimmers getting to Finals and unfortunately, narrowly missing out on medals. Our Region is one of the toughest to compete within, with some very large clubs hosted within the area. But we thrive on the competition, it pushes us to train harder and makes us all stronger.”
Competitions didn’t stop there for Hart Swimming Club. Hart SC later in May took a bumper squad to the Windsor Open Meet held at the new Maidenhead Leisure Centre. Hart SC swimmers brought 13 medals back to Fleet, making it a very successful weekend in Maidenhead!
A squad of 32 swimmers from Hart SC competed at the Basingstoke Open Meet over 4th and 5th June, held in Basingstoke. Hart SC swimmers collected 27 medals over the weekend and even more personal best times. A fantastic achievement for the club!
Coach Darren said “It’s been a fantastic spring for all our swimmers, and we couldn’t be prouder. Big thank you to all our coaches who have supported our swimmers across all our squads during a very busy swimming period. Thank you to Dan, James, Will & Alex plus Libby, and Maya for all the support they give us. Special thank you to Balaz who is leaving the coaching team shortly for a new adventure. You’ve been incredible as a coach and mentor for our younger swimmers.
The swimming season isn’t over yet though. We have a busy June and July before the season closes. We have the Hampshire Development Meet, Club Championships for our main squads and our Masters squad has a contingent of 4 swimmers travelling up to Aberdeen to compete in the Masters British Championships, followed by the Hampshire Masters Championships. Lets keep working hard, collecting those PB’s and enjoying our swimming.”