A large team of thirty-one swimmers from Age Group Development, Junior Silver and Gold Squads took part in this one day event at Middlesbrough’s Neptune Centre. The meet provided the opportunity for swimmers to take part in the 1500m and 800m freestyle events as well as the sprint events. The club came away with 29 medals from the gala: seven gold, thirteen silver and nine bronze medals.
Making a clean sweep in her events was fourteen year old Lauren Exley. Lauren finished in first place in the 100m I/M, freestyle, backstroke and breaststroke events and recorded some excellent personal best (pb) times in all events.
Fourteen year olds Jay Manners and Adam Cambrook also struck gold. Jay won the 100m butterfly and 100m backstroke events, finished second in the 100m breaststroke and third in the 100m freestyle achieving pbs in three events.  Adam finished first in the 1500m freestyle, his first attempt at this event.
Joseph Pomfret, thirteen, took home a silver medal from each of his four events: 100m freestyle, butterfly, I/M and breaststroke, setting new pbs in the latter two events. J.J. Robins, twelve, also won four medals: silver in the 100m backstroke and breaststroke and bronze in the100m and 1500m freestyle events achieving three pbs.
Winning a further seven medals between them were Alisha Ballantine, twelve, Darcy Palmer, fourteen and Jamie Kemp, thirteen. Alisha finished second in the 100m backstroke and freestyle events and finished third in the 100m breaststroke. Darcy won silver medals in the 800m freestyle and 100m butterfly and Jamie finished second in the 100m backstroke and breaststroke events. Darcy and Jamie set improved times in all their events.
Achieving new pbs and a medal each were: Vanessa Rubio, eleven, ten year old  Caitlin Cambrook, and twelve year olds Matthew Phillips, Ben Hutchinson and Adam Boxall. Vanessa finished second in the 800m freestyle, Caitlin was third in the 100m I/M, Matthew, Ben and Adam won a bronze in the 1500m, 100 I/M and 100m backstroke events respectively.
This gala provided the rare opportunity for the under nine year olds to compete and it was great to see some of the youngest members of the club taking part in their first ‘away’ gala.  Making their debuts were:  eight year olds Tilly Abbott and Jessica Ord, nine year olds Jack Ashman, Lorenzo Corsi, Katie Johnson, Louie Scott and Lauren Ventress, ten year old Olivia Miller and eleven year old Emily Atchison.