Eight Lakelanders were in attendance at the Bangor Aurora complex for last weekend’s Swim Ulster Summer Meet event and again they enjoyed great success.

Ellie McCartney tried new events at this level for the first time along with her favoured Breaststroke and returned with medals in each event. The 12 year old swam in both the 50m and 100m Butterfly gaining new personal bests as well as silver medals in both events. The time in the 100m fly also resulted in her seventh Division One time. Ellie also competed in the three shorter Freestyle events; her new Long Course PB of 31.06 saw an eighth time along with a bronze medal in the 50m Freestyle. Another bronze medal was awarded to Ellie in the 100m Freestyle and another PB in the 200m Freestyle by one second resulted in a silver medal. Ellie matched this in the 200m Individual Medley with another silver before finishing the Meet with two gold medals in the 50m and 200m Breaststroke. Being competitive in a number of new strokes, and with eight medals, this Meet proved very successful for Ellie.

Oisin McManus competed in the opening event of the Friday night session, the 1500m Freestyle, where he achieved a gold medal in a time of 18:31.11. Oisin’s next race took place on the Sunday session - The 400m IM - an event Oisin has only began to compete in. Going into the race on a time 5:22.38 he dropped two seconds to come first and receive another gold. Finally, in the last session Oisin competed in the 200m Freestyle where he secured third place earning himself the bronze medal in a time of 2:16.53 taking home the trio of medals from his three races.

On Saturday Kealan McShea (14) swam to a silver medal in 100m Freestyle and gold in 50m Backcrawl. Sunday saw him take seven seconds off his 100m Butterfly to finish fourth in a time of 1.12.89. In his final race he won a bronze medal in the 100m Backcrawl in a time that was just outside his PB.

Annabel Morrison, 10, was looking forward to her first time competing in a 50 metre pool and was swimming 100m Breaststroke and 50m Butterfly. After a good warm up and advice from coach Rob, her first swim was the 100m Breaststroke. Annabel finished in a 1 minute 43 seconds she was delighted to get not only a personal best but also a well-deserved gold medal – a first of many at this level! Her 50 metre fly proved to be tough but she was happy to do it in 46 seconds. Annabel really enjoyed her first time swimming long course and competing at the higher level.

Lewis McCartney was trying to add to his seven divisional times and working on his new swimming techniques. New Long Course PBs in 50m Breaststroke and 100m Butterfly saw fourth and sixth place finishes respectively. More top 10 finishes came in the 200m IM, 200m Freestyle and 400m Freestyle. Lewis swam to bronze medals in his favoured events 50m and 100m Freestyle while still working on his relatively new straight arm technique.

10 year old Isobel Lannon took part in three events on the Saturday completing her first 100m Long Course Breaststroke in 1.49.04s and finishing fourth overall, narrowly missing out on a qualifying time by half a second. Issy received a bronze medal for her 50m Butterfly and a 2 second PB. A good swim in her 100m Backstroke saw hit her long course qualifying time and fourth place overall.