Weekend 1
The Derbyshire asa county championships began on the 16thof February. The first session started off with some fast swimming, but just as important, swimmers had a professional attitude to start the gala, which was a target meet for the majority of the swimmer competing. We finished the session with 3 swimmers in finals for the 100 IM, Laura Broadbent and Elizabeth Murray won the final for their age group, with Laura going a tad faster in the final than she swam in the heat, and Brandon Hotham finished 5thin his final.
In the next session of the day we had once again 3 finalists all in the 100 Frs, Elizabeth Murray and Jess Lindridge competed in the 14 year olds final finishing first and eighth. Laura Broadbent was the other finalist for the session competing in the 16 year olds age group finishing 3rd.
The final session of the day had the boys 800 Frs and girls 400 Frs, Sam Nicholls finished 2ndoverall and 1stin his age group in the 800 Frs. The girls 400 Frs had a lot of great swims, which included Ella Fenwick negative splitting her 400 going out in a 3:08 on her first 200 and coming back in in 3:03 on her second.
Sunday had a fast start with the boys 100 Frs with various sized PBs, the biggest coming from little G with a 3 second PB swimming a 1:07.39, Brandon Hotham also qualified for the 15 years final finishing 4thjust .07 off his time he did in the heats. There were 4 girls who qualified for the 100 final, Amber Downham won the 14 years age group final, Isobelle Moore and Sophie Baker swam in the 15 years final finishing 3rdand 5th, Ellie Bradshaw qualified and swum in the 16 years final finishing 6thand was almost 2 seconds faster in the final than the heats. 2 more golds were one in the girls 200 Backstroke with Amber and Laura both winning.
The second session started off with some fast breastroke from the girls, Hannah Dempsey had a cheeky 4 second PB. The finals featured 7 swimmers: Oliver Hadfield10/11 yrs 5th, Jake Hotham 14yrs 8th, Brandon Hotham 15yrs 3rd, Amber Downham 14yrs 1st, Sophie baker 15yrs 4th, Laura Broadbent 16yrs 1st, Ellie Bradshaw 16yrs 5th .
The third and final session of the weekend had the boys 400 freestyle and the girls 200 IM. Great swims to end a tiring weekend by Isobelle Moore, Laura Broadbent and Ellie Bradshaw ended a successful first weekend at the county championships with Laura ending the weekend with a silver medal.
Weekend 2
Confidence was high heading into weekend 2, Saturday started off with the boys 200 IM and the girls 1500 freestyle. Guillermo started the day off strong with a 8 second Pb in the 200 IM, Jake Hotham also had a nice little Pb, almost 1 second faster than his entry time. Unfortunately there were no swimmers in the 1500.
Saturdays second session featured the boys and girls 50 fly, boys 1500 freestyle. Joel Hudson got the exact same time as his 50 fly. 3 ladies made the final for 50 fly, Elizabeth Murray, Isobelle Moore and Laura Broadbent, they finished in 2nd6th5thwith Laura qualifying in 8thand moving up to 5thin the final whilst also swimming faster than she did in the heats. Sam Nicholls had a good 1500 swimming a 17:17.48 finishing 1stin his age group and second overall.
The third session featured the girls 100 backstroke where we had 4 qualifiers for the final, Jessica Lindridge, Elizabeth Murray, Isobelle Moore and Laura Broadbent. In the finals Elizabeth Murray got gold, Laura Broadbent got silver just 0.03 off getting the gold, Isobelle Moore finished 4thand Jessica Lindridge finished 8th. The girls 200 freestyle the 3 young regional ladies Ella Fenwick, Hannah Dempsey and Ellie-Jo hadfield started the event off strong with the 3 of them all having very good swims, and silvers for Elizabeth Murray and Laura Broadbent who continue their great performances.
Sundays first session featured the girls 100 breaststroke, boys 50 freestyle and girls 400 IM. Isobelle Moore started the day off with a gutsy 400 IM. The girls 100 Breaststroke had 3 finalists, Sophie baker 5th, Laura Broadbent 1stand Ellie Bradshaw 5thfinishing off a relatively quiet session.
The penultimate session had a brave swim from Jake Hotham in the 400 IM, Brandon Hotham qualifying for the final and swimming just half a second slower in the final than he did in the heats. The 50 freestyle produced 2 finalists with once again Laura Broadbent and Elizabeth making the final finishing 5thand 1st.
The final session of the championships featured a bold 200 Butterfly by Brandon Hotham, especially after 2 long weekends of racing, and was rewarded finishing 2nd. The girls 50 Backstroke ended the competition strong with Elizabeth Murray getting the gold in her age group and Laura Broadbent getting the silver.
