Windsor Junior Graded Meet
Saturday 14th May saw a number of junior swimmers (ages 9 through 12) head up the M4 to Maidenhead to attend the Windsor Swimming Club Junior Graded Meet. Being a graded event meant that this was an excellent opportunity for those swimmers with little or no experience of competition swimming. An added incentive was the awarding of medals through to 8th place.
On offer were 200 Freestyle, 50 Backstroke, 50 Breast, 50 Fly, 50 Free, and 100 IM. The 25m pool was excellent, with great spectator viewing, including a walkway above one end of the pool from which you could cheer on your lane!
The events were well attended - with up to 87 competitors per event. Clubs competing were reasonably local, including Amersham, Chalfont Otters, Chesham, Croydon Amphibians, Leatherhead, Maidenhead Marlins, Reading, Tilehurst, Windsor and Wycombe, with ourselves the long distance champions!
Our team included Sophie Protheroe, Emily Giles, Katie Pugh, Katherine Arnold in the 10 year girls, and Alice Harnden in the 11 year girls, with David Vick 9 year boys, Owen Pugh and Bertie Smith 11 year boys. It was to be a day of highs and lows. The lows came in the form of DQs - where the judges were fair but firm, providing the youngsters with a real taste of competition standards with Katherine being the only one of our team to avoid any penalty.
Following good efforts in the early races success came when Katie won the 50m Butterfly 10 year category in 42.86 our only success in the morning events.
So to lunch a little thoughtful about how challenging competition swimming really is, before Alice, Katherine and Katie returned to compete in the 100m IM. Katherine stormed through to get her first medal, finishing 7th, with Katie grabbing Bronze in 1.34.20. The boys 50m Breaststroke then saw David speed to Bronze, with Owen and Bertie just missing out on a medal. Girls 50m Breaststroke had Emily, Sophie, Alice and Katherine compete, with Katherine adding another medal to her collection, finishing 6th. Things were looking up!
Now we fidgetted in our seats as the three boys lined up for the 100m IM but Owen managed to keep his legs together in the fly, and gained his first medal finishing 7th. Whew..... what next? Ah... the Girls 50m Freestyle - with all girls competing - Katherine moving fast to finish 5th, and Katie gaining her 2nd Gold in a time of 37.32. Bertie and David wrapped up the final event with the Boys 50m Freestyle with David securing 5th place for another medal in 45.12, and it was all over
Trowbridge came away with a great haul of medals, including 2 Golds and 2 Bronzes, and a good number of top 8 finishes. It was a fun day, an excellent opportunity to experience competition swimming under good judging, that gave us all a real taste of the technical skill necessary to succeed, without it being too serious.
A big thank you to Windsor for organising a worthwhile, enjoyable day. And a big thanks to the coaches and other volunteers from Trowbridge who helped out, including Coach Pete Daniell, Bertie's parents Liz and Tim (our Judge) Smith, and Alice's Dad, Paul Harnden our timekeeper.
Richard Pugh