Fine margins separate clubs in closely-fought contest

Replete with their new Western Registrations swim hats, a total of 43 swimmers, aged nine to over 21, made the 160-mile round trip on Saturday.

This was the club’s fourth outing of the year and with two wins out of three so far, they knew a victory over COB would place them in a commanding position in the table. Despite a number of team swimmers absent, head coach Rob Eynon took a strong squad with a fantastic team ethic.

With the usual format of Medley and Freestyle relays, as well as five individual events, there are four different age groups competing ranging from swimmers born in 2007 to 2001 and older. It was obvious from the outset that this was going to be a close and hard fought gala. After the initial Medley Relays, COB edged ahead with 100 vs 92, and that pattern of a closely-fought contest continued right to the last of the 56 heats.

Throughout the gala, the scores were either equal or separated by one point a total of 17 times, with 1,145 points on offer. Lakelanders, despite being in the lead on numerous occasions, lost on the night to a competitive COB by just nine points, with a score of 568 vs COB’s 577.

Despite the defeat, the Lakelanders team ethic shone through, none more so than Maria Kelly-Neill who was asked to swim up from Group B to the elite Group D.

She contributed 23 points towards the team’s total, the highlight of which came when she finished fourth in the Breaststroke, ahead of two Group D competitors in a new PB time of 45.15 seconds.

Despite being down eight points after the initial Medley Relays, the Lakelanders reduced the gap slightly to seven points by the end of the Backstroke. Wins by Isobel Lannon, Ellie McCartney, Kealan McShea and Patrick Williams helped close the gap.

More first places for the Lakelanders came in the Breaststroke with Annabel Morrison, Ellie McCartney, and Sorcha Lavelle for the girls while for the boys it was Jack Maravelakis, Oisin McManus and Patrick Williams.

At the end of the Breaststroke, the Lakelanders had a nine-point advantage over COB and were looking good heading into the Fly and Free where they are traditionally strong.

The winning continued in the Butterfly where Isobel Lannon, Caitlin Love and Oisin McManus added 21 points from three firsts. Ellie McCartney was denied first place by 0.14 of a second in the Fly, and as a result missed out on making it seven wins from seven swims.

A notable performance was achieved by Oliver Mooney who smashed his PB in the Fly reducing it by 4.5 seconds to under the one minute mark (58.57).

After the Butterfly, COB led by one point. The freestyle again saw Isobel Lannon, Ellie McCartney, Kealan McShea and Patrick Williams take firsts, with Oisin and Kealan both swimming sub 30 seconds. Kealan along with the other Group C boys, Ben Lynch, Oisin McManus and Peter Dolan secured the maximum points possible by winning their two relays and taking first and second place in every event in between.

The same feat was almost replicated by Group A girls Anna McDaid, Annabel Morrison, Isobel Lannon, Abigail Boyd, Cora Cassidy and Leah Irwin, who dropped just one point across all seven events they competed in.

Lewis McCartney swam up into the Group D heats and was the fastest swimmer in the pool for the Lakelanders on the night completing his 50 Free in a new pb of 28.22 seconds. Lewis contributed 42 points to the overall total with five second place finishes in the oldest age group.

With two events to go, the IM and the Freestyle Relays, COB led by a single point, 401 to 400.

Again, Isobel, Annabel, Ellie, Sorcha, Patrick, Oisin, Kealan and Lewis shared first or second place finishes in an event which tests all four strokes over 100 metres. PB’s tumbled across the board, most notably for Leah Irwin, Orla Murphy, Eimear Magee, Amy O’Reilly and Niamh O’Kane and Callum O’Hare, Nial Bruce, Darragh Cox, Ben Lynch, Matthew Dolan.

Incredibly, there was still just one point between the teams before a thrilling finish.

The gala would be decided by eight heats of the Freestyle Relay, which the Lakelanders needed to win five of in order to overcome the one point deficit. Despite fantastic efforts by all, the Lakelanders achieved three wins out of the eight, namely Group A and B girls and Group C boys.

Tiny margins separated the two teams all through the gala, highlighted again by the one second difference between first and second place in the Girls Group C free relay – the Lakelanders girls ending on the wrong side of the result.

MVS (like Most Valuable Player MVP, but for swimmers) on the night goes to Isobel Lannon for her dix first place finishes in the six events she competed in, definitely a swimmer to watch in the future.

Under the watchful eye of new head coach Rob, who everyone at the club wishes all the best of success over the next few months as he concentrates on the swimmer’s fitness and technique, the Lakelanders squad who travelled to Belfast did themselves and their parents proud and showed true team spirit.

That’s two wins out of four for the Lakelanders who now look forward to visiting Lurgan for the final PTL gala of the season on March 4 with warm-up to be confirmed.

The club asks that all swimmers keep that date free to give swimmers the opportunity to compete and participate as the season moves forward (let’s hope Arney isn’t on!) If you already know your swimmer is unable to attend this final gala and you have been in the PT Squad previously, then please inform lakelanders@mail.com.

The committee would like to sincerely thank the parents and volunteers who made the trip to Belfast on Saturday for the team event, without whom these events just wouldn’t happen.

We acknowledge the time, effort and money it takes to give that commitment, but undoubtedly everyone agrees, the benefits in physical and emotional health as well as self-esteem, discipline and team ethics it brings to the young (and not so young) swimmers far outweighs any costs.