There was some superb performances by Enniskillen Lakelanders swimmers at the Irish Summer Nationals at the National Aquatic Centre in Dublin last week.
Five competitors from the club took part in the event with Ellie McCartney continuing to enhance her growing reputation with four gold medals as well as a consideration time for the Swim Ireland Irish National squad while there was also a four medal haul for Oisin McCaffrey McManus.
With a strong of Personal Best times and final qualifications this proved to be yet another successful outing for the local swimmers.
Competitors from all over Ireland and Europe as well as faraway places like Dubai, Toronto and India travelled to Dublin for the championships with 36 clubs from outside Ireland participating. The largest swimming event in Ireland saw 130 events and finals split into almost 500 heats with 4,630 entries by 830 swimmers who were hoping for personal bests, finals, medals and Irish titles.  
The event took place over five days with three sessions each day; older swimmers first thing followed by the 14 and under mid morning with Finals taking place each evening. 
The Enniskillen Lakelanders had five swimmers involved in individual events and a relay returning with five gold medals, one silver medal and two bronze medals as well as a fantastic number of Personal Bests and Final qualifications.
The youngest member of the squad, Ellie McCartney, swam in 10 events and qualified for finals in every event with fantastic PBs. 
The 13-year-old returned home with four Irish titles; the 100m and 200m Breaststroke as well as the 200m and 400m Individual Medley. On the first day of the Meet Ellie qualified fastest in the heats for the 100m Breaststroke and the gruelling 400m Individual Medley. 
That evening she returned to the pool to win gold in the 100m Breaststroke with a new personal best of 1:14.51 – a new club record and ending her season as the fastest 13-year-old girl in the UK and Ireland. 
This was followed within the hour with the 400m Individual Medley where Ellie smashed 18 seconds off her time to win another gold in a time of 5:12.41 – another club record at any age. The second day saw Ellie compete in the 50m Freestyle where she finished fifth fastest with a new PB as well as 100m Butterfly to finish seventh and the 200m Breaststroke. 
Ellie qualified for all three finals and was targeting the latter as the priority. During the evening session she was composed and swam a fantastic race to win the 200m Breaststroke by 10 seconds in a time of 2:38.58 – another gold medal and club record, but more importantly a consideration time for the Swim Ireland Irish National Squad. Her performance was noted by the Swim Ireland website as ‘Swim of the evening’ as well as being singled out by the National Performance Director as one of the picks of the day. Jon Rudd said “a National Squad consideration time from Ellie, one year earlier than projected in this event with a storming back 100 for close to even pacing across the two halves”. 
The following day Ellie PB’d in the 400m, finishing seventh overall before knocking seven seconds off her 200m Individual Medley to win her fourth gold medal of the Meet in a time of 2:26.72. 
On Saturday she finished 12th in the 100m Freestyle and excelled in her weakest event, 100m Backcrawl, completing the final in seventh position. 
On the last day Ellie swam the 800m Freestyle for the second time ever, ending the Meet as the seventh fastest in Ireland. Credit must go to the Lakelanders coaching team as well as Andrew Bree for his recent help in getting these results.
Oisin Mc Manus qualified for 10 events at the Irish National Finals. On day one, in the punishing 400m Individual Medley (IM), he finished with a personal best (PB) and qualification for the final, where he took the silver medal. 
Day two saw Oisin compete in the 100m Butterfly and the 200m Breaststroke, where he posted two excellent swims with PBs in both, narrowly missing out on a medal with fourth place in the Breaststroke. Day 3 dawned and Oisin’s two strongest events, the 200m IM and the 1500m Freestyle were in front of him, but with eighth and sixth place rankings - he knew he’d need to work hard. 
The 200m IM prelims brought another PB and another final, where he added a bronze medal. 
In the 1500m Freestyle, Oisin showed his ownership of an event where he was 2016 13/U Irish champion. 
Starting steadily Oisin however was 25m adrift of the leaders at the midpoint, but he passed the leader in the last 15m to finish first in his heat on a time of 17.39m, a huge 22.15s PB. 
But the ranking first position swimmer had yet to swim, and so there followed a nail biting 17.41 minutes of the second heat, however by the final 15 metres it became clear that Oisin had taken the gold medal. 
On the final day, he put in a storming performance in the 800m Freestyle to finish with a 13s PB and bronze medal, taking his event tally to four medals. And so after 10 events, 16 races (heats/finals), 10 PBs and four medals an elated Oisin headed home for a welcome four week break before training begins again in September for next time.
Kealan McShea, who turned 16 this week, entered seven events in a very competitive age group. 
He impressed his coach on day one when he reached the final of the demanding 400m IM to finish in fifth place overall with a nine second PB in a time of 4.58mins. He followed this with a swim to his PB in the 100m Breaststroke. 
On Day two Kealan had a great swim in the 200m Breaststroke reaching an unexpected final with a PB of six seconds finishing in an excellent eighth place overall. This is credit to his coach Rob Eynon as a year ago Kealan had not featured in this event. 
On Friday he had two further swims in the 100m Freestyle and 200m IM, the latter resulting in first reserve for the final. 
Kealan missed day four of the meet as he travelled to Castlewellan to compete in the Ulster Fleadh. On Sunday he returned to round off a successful meet in the 200m Backstroke once again achieving a PB of 5.55secs and reserve for the final. Kealan would also like to thank Nigel McGrath Sports and Remedial Massage Therapy for his help in preparing him for the meet.
Ben Lynch competed in five events. He showed great improvement in the 800m Freestyle and 1500m Freestyle where he had a 13 second PB to finish in fifth place and a 20 second PB to finish in sixth place respectively.
Lewis McCartney was attending the Championships for a third year and is continuing to challenge in this difficult age group. Participating in seven events the 16 year old finished inside the top 20 in each of them narrowly missing out in two finals. Some great PBs in 100m and 200m Breaststroke following additional training with double Olympian Andrew Bree and the 100m Butterfly saw Lewis finish the season on a high.
The three boys were joined by Connor McKenzie for the 4 x 200m Freestyle relay on the Wednesday evening where they finished 15th.
All swimmers and parents were grateful to the Sponsor, Cavanagh Kelly, for providing their Div 1 event kit. And special thanks were reserved for Enniskillen Lakelanders Committee and Coaches Rob Eynon and Fionna Martin for their support and guidance throughout the season.