2005 National Team County Championships

DEVON ARE DIVISION 2 CHAMPIONS!

Kelly College swimmers made up 40% of the Devon County Team who won Division 2 of the 2005 National County Team Championships at Ponds Forge in Sheffield at the weekend.

1100 swimmers from 33 English Counties, North & South Wales and Scotland East, West and South, their supporters and Presidents packed the huge Ponds Forge Pool on Sunday to compete in two Divisions. The 10 lane 50 pool was divided into two 25m pools one for each division and the galas were run at the same time.

The Fourteen team members who were competing from Kelly College included Jack Cockerton, Luke Wakefield, Laura Sprague, Amy Bayliss, Sophie Calpin, Ben Clark, Amanda Sanderson, Sophie Howe, Tom Howe, Matthew Henry, Philip Channon, Rebecca Fletcher, Joshua Lake and Megan Mackenzie. Danny Brown from Kelly having recently joined the school was swimming for South Wales where he came 2^nd in the 100m Breaststroke in Division 1. The disappointing aspect to the Devon County Team once again was the lack of representation from Plymouth Leander.

Devon were in the lead after the first few events and were never toppled from this position. In the early stages Lincolnshire were snapping at their heels and by event 13 they had cut the lead to just two points but Devon hung on to pole position.

By event 20 Lincolnshire were overtaken by Staffordshire but they were unable to make a sustained challenge and, although the strong Lincoln team pulled ahead of Staffs towards the end, Devon’s lead steadily increased. Going into the final set of relays Devon were in an almost unassailable lead and only a catastrophe could prevent them winning.

Devon finished on 489 with Lincolnshire on 461 and Staffordshire on 447. These three Counties plus Suffolk (407) won promotion to Division 1.

The team had 3 first, 5 second and 4 third place finishes but it was the whole team effort as swimmers finished 9^th or above in 29 of the 31 events that put Devon in such a strong position. The strength in depth was demonstrated when out of the six medley relay events two were won and one finished as runners up. The others finish 5^th, 6th and 7^th. The mixed freestyle relay team finished third

The strong 16/17 boys team of Patrick Friel, Jack Cockerton, Dwaine Bushell and Luke Wakefield stormed through the field to win their heat in 1.50.37 but had to wait to see if they were bettered in the second heat.  Derbyshire won that heat but were not quick enough to overtake the Devon quartet.

The 14/15 boys team of Matthew Henry, Alex Bunney, Joshua Lake and Ben Clark emulated their older counterparts by winning the second heat in confident style in 1.53.84 to beat Staffordshire’s time, the winners of the first heat and take maximum points.

The senior girls team of Megan Bushnell, Amanda Sanderson, Kim Saddler and Charlotte Perry won their heat in 2.06.99 but were just not quite fast enough to beat Worcestershire from heat 1 and had to settle for second.

In the only freestyle team race, the final 6 x 50m mixed event, the strong Lincolnshire team raced ahead to win the heat but the team of Megan Bushnell, Ben Clark, Laura Sprague, James Bunney, Megan MacKenzie and Luke Wakefield put up in a stirling effort to finish second.

Their other rivals, Staffordshire, were a second faster in heat 2, pushing Devon into third. However by that stage it was academic as even a disqualification could not stop Devon becoming Champions.

Jack Cockerton was the team’s only individual winner when he took the 16/17 100m breaststroke comfortably in 1.05.23. Jack also finished 3^rd in the backstroke event in a new best time.

There were four individual second places. Megan Bushnell took the first in the 16/17 100m backstroke in 1.06.51. In the same age group Kim Saddler set a new pb when she finished second in the fly in1.06.44.

James Bunney swam a superb race to knock over three seconds off his best time in finishing second in the 12/13 100m butterfly behind a very strong Lincolnshire swimmer. James also knocked two seconds off his freestyle time to go below 60 for the first time.

Matthew Henry was the fourth swimmer to take a runners up spot when he swam a very determined 100m in the 14/15 age group in 1.00.54.

Jodie Worbey swam to a new pb in the 14/15 butterfly to finish third in 1.05.61 while  Laura Sprague also finished third by knocking 2 seconds off her time in the 12/13 freestyle.. Maria Graney was another swimmer in form as she finished third in the 12/13 backstroke lowering her time by over a second and a half to finish in 1.09.36.

There were a number of other excellent swims. In the 12/13  breaststroke events Mitchell Bennellick took almost two seconds off his time while Emma Carter reduced her time by over a second. Ben Clark took over two seconds off his 14/15 freestyle entry time.

As well as winning Division 2 and the ISTC cup, Devon won promotion to Division 1 next year. This will be tough but we look forward to it.

Congratulations to the whole of team.

Full results are on the ASA website

The event was filmed for a new sports programme. Most of the filming was done in the Division 1 pool but some filming was also done in Division 2. If you want to see this programme you will find it on UKTV Gold and UKTV G2 as follows

                               

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