Staffordshire County Championship Skins & Relays 2019 : Times and Report

Stafford Leisure Centre, Stafford.  24th March 2019

_______________________________________________________________________________

Reader Information: You will need to login to view the times for this event [Clubland Member login required].

__________________________________________________________________________________________

STAFFS COUNTY CHAMPS 2019 – SKINS AND RELAYS

After getting home for a well earned pint and a rest the Head Coach pairing of Simon and Ian went back to Stafford LC for the 2019 County Skins and Relays.

The club had last year seen two swimmers make Skins and therefore planned ahead in terms of entering relay teams so that any swimmer qualifying for SKINS would have team mates present on the day.

Matt Gates – current Men’s senior captain – became the 3rd swimmer ( After Ella Cooper and George Greener last year) to qualify for SKINS by coming in the top 8 in the open age of 200m IM in the championships. SKINS are where a chosen stroke provides a race for all 8 over 50m – the slowest is then eliminated – you carry on with randomly selected strokes until a final race off for the last 2 swimmers decides who is the champion.

In terms of relay teams we entered 4 age group teams with both doing Free and Medley relays.

SKINS

Matt was up against 7 swimmers with either National or Regional experience – but when Free Style came out first he would be in with a chance – he came 3rd in heat 1 with 26.35 seconds – after 90 seconds rest it was Free style again and he swam 27.12 to come 4th and stay in with the big boys. Breast stroke was the 3rd stroke chosen and Matt gave it his all but was eliminated and 5 went on to swim for the title.

RELAYS

Up to 13 different clubs had teams in the different age groups – their were heats and then all clubs ranked under the Heat Declared Winner method.

Age 11

The team was Bella Smith, Jaina Muogbo, Lana Clamp and Bella Richards – they came an amazing 2nd in the medley relay and a brilliant 4th in the free style relay (all are 50m legs)

Age 13

The team was Ella Cooper, Ruby Welsford, Georgia Ulyett and Charlie Miller– they came 6th in the medley relay and 9th in the free style relay

Age 15

The team was Katie Spooner, Sophie Fowkes, Caitlin Thomas and Issy Stanley – they came 9th in the medley relay and 12th in the free style relay

Open

The team was Matt Gates, Adam Doughty, Finley Brown and George Stevens – they came 8th in the medley relay and 9th in the free style relay