Last Chance County Qualifier 2015 – Report

In what proved to be a highly competitive gala hosted by Peterlee ASC and Derwentside ASC, it was nine year old Ayumi Faulds who came home with Sunderland’s only medal.  Finishing third in the 100m I/M, Ayumi also gained top ten places in the 50m Breaststroke, 50m butterfly, 50m Backstroke and 50m freestyle, finishing 5th, 5th, 6th and 6th respectively and achieving 3 PBs

Eleven year olds Caitlin Cambrook, Lydia Matterson, and Grace Abbott and nine year olds Tilly Abbott, Yuki Faulds, Jessica Ord, Elyssa Palmer and Fran Proctor all achieved top ten finishes.

Caitlin finished 4th in the 50m butterfly, 5th in the 200m backstroke (improving her time by more than 13 seconds), and 9th in the 100m butterfly and 200m freestyle events.  Lydia improved her time by 6 seconds to finish 6th in the 200m backstroke and was 8th in the 100m backstroke and breaststroke events and set new PBs in all her swims.  Grace set a new PB and finished 10th in the 100m breaststroke while her sister, Tilly, finished 9th in the 50m butterfly, improving her time by 3 seconds.  Jessica improved her times in her three events and finished 8th in the 50m breaststroke.  Making her debut in a short course gala, Yuki finished 7th in the 50m butterfly and 100m I/M and 9th in the 50m backstroke. Elyssa achieved 8th and 10th place finishes in the 50m freestyle and 50m backstroke events respectively, setting a new PB in the freestyle.   With four top ten results, Fran also recorded 4 PBs, finishing 4th in the 200m breaststroke, 7th in the 50m butterfly (improving his time by 3.5 seconds) and 10th in the 50m freestyle and 50m backstroke events.

Medals aside, Sunderland’s swimmers continued to show great improvement with Georgia Richardson, 10, 12 year olds Benjamin Milford and Rhianna Ibbitson and 13 year old Maria Birchall improving their personal best times.  Georgia set new PBs in the 50m freestyle and 100m breaststroke.  Benjamin improved his 100m breaststroke time by 3 seconds to finish 13th while Rhianna recorded significant improvements in the 100m breaststroke and 200m I/M reducing her times by 9 and 8 seconds respectively.  Maria also swam a good 100m breaststroke race to reduce her time by 10 seconds and finish in 15th place.  Khristian Dungca, 12, finished 25th in the 50m freestyle.