This report covers the exploits of several of our club members who have just taken on the best in Wales at the recent Welsh Winter Meet.

The Welsh Schools and Winter Meet is one of the 'big three' Welsh long course meets that take place annually in the Welsh swimming calendar. Being a long course (50m pool) event, it is generally targeted by most swimmers as the primary Welsh meet of the autumn period.

As regular readers will know, Tenby have club members who train with the club or with the county performance programme and even with the national performance group in Swansea. Being a relatively high level event with quite difficult entry qualification times, the club entry was therefore made up of our most proficient swimmers from all three training areas.

The Tenby members who swam were: Bethan Davie, Dan Davies, Ffion Davies, Andrew James, Sam Lewis, Niamh Slack and Hannah Saunders.

As we have come to expect, the swimmers did not disappoint and there were some excellent results over the course of the three days of competition.

Club swimmers Ffion and Dan made some good improvements and will be taking the experience on board as they up their training in the coming months. Andrew James has been working through an extremely tough period of training in Swansea in the past few weeks, and was not expected to improve on his times at this meet. His coach was instead looking for consistency in pacing and stroke rates as he builds for bigger events in the New Year.

Sam, Niamh and Hannah, who are our county performance squad swimmers, all had a good weekend. They recorded a number of impressive PB's and despite all being out of age in their respective events, managed to place well in the overall rankings. Niamh also made the final of the Yr 7-9 200m butterfly. Well done all of you.

Despite not targeting this meet in her training plan, Welsh international Bethan Davie had a storming weekend. Over the autumn period, Bethan who is a top level breaststroke swimmer, has at the request of the Welsh national performance director, been focusing on a number of 'off' events to give more balance to her training in the early part of the season. This seems to have paid dividends.

Entering eight events, Bethan won four gold and three silver medals (and was fourth in the eighth event she took part in). She set four new championship records, six new long course PB's and no less than six national qualifying times for the big event in Sheffield next summer. This is fantastic early season form and as a result of the times she recorded in the 100m and 200m breaststroke, she has already re-qualified for the Welsh National Youth Squad for September 2010-2011. Wow!

Bethan will now be getting her head down in training in the build up to the first really big event of the year for her, which is the Welsh Dragon Meet scheduled to take place in Swansea in early January. Her Christmas break will be spent mainly in the pool this year!

The Tenby coaching team were delighted to see how well the group of swimmers from the county swimming performance programme did over the course of the weekend. They were having a great time poolside and spurring each other on to some super swims. There were a huge number of PB's and we are delighted to report that Kelsey Williams, of Haverfordwest, recorded a national qualifying time in the 200m breaststroke and was only half a second off in the 100m event.

A fantastic result which is sure to motivate the whole squad to bigger and better things. Well done Kelsey and well done coach Paul on recording your first NQT!

ForthcomingEvents

November 27-29: Welsh Capital Open Meet. At Cardiff Int. Pool. Closed.

December 5-6: West Wales Sub-Regional Meet, Penlan. This is a target meet for our Junior Squad swimmers. Closed.

December 13-15: Club Championships. This is a compulsory event. You have all been entered and we expect you all to swim unless you have a very good reason not to! Check notice board for details.

January 8-10: New Year Dragon Meet. WNP Swansea. Top LC competition in Wales. Very tough entry times. Closing date December 5.

Club News

As well as actually taking part in competitive swimming, there are other avenues into involvement in top level sport. There are very rewarding opportunities for young people who want to become involved in officiating and managing big swimming events. We are very pleased that one of our senior swimmers, Olwen Davies, has just started out on the Millennium Volunteer programme, and was helping out for the first time at the Welsh Winter Meet in Swansea. By all accounts she had a really good time, so if anyone else is interested, have a chat with Olwen to see what it is all about.

Also, don't forget that there are now really good career opportunities these days in professional swim teaching and coaching. If anyone would like more details of what is on offer and how to start out on a career path, by all means ask John or Steve poolside.

We have the Club Championships coming up on December 13, 14 and 15 during the normal club training times on those days. As we have said before, we expect all club members to take part, and as a result you have been pre-entered for the races we think you are suitable for. There is no charge to take part and loads of medals and trophies up for grabs. Please check the entry details on the notice board to make sure you have not been left out by mistake.

If you want to order swim gear for Christmas, please place your orders as soon as poossible at the club shop to avoid disappointment.

Finally, we need donations of raffle prizes for the club Christmas Party. Please bring something in and drop it off with the ladies at the club shop.

S.D.