British Age Group Record for Hungry Harrison

Posted on 19 March 2009

Sprint­er James Har­ri­son is the high­light of the day after a record-break­ing dis­play earns him a tick­et to Prague.

After miss­ing out on qual­i­fi­ca­tion in the 50m freestyle ear­li­er in the week, a deter­mined James Har­ri­son set a British Age Group Record of 51.59 in the heats of the 100m freestyle, to qual­i­fy in style to swim the 100m freestyle and the 4 x 100m freestyle relay at the Euro­pean Juniors.

Join­ing James in Prague will be Han­nah War­dle, who clocked a per­son­al best of 2:37.54 in her favourite event, the 200m breast­stroke, to qual­i­fy in 11th for the semi-finals.

In the semi-final, Han­nah then improved her ear­li­er mark by over a sec­ond to set a new life­time best of 2:36.10 qual­i­fy­ing her in 3rd place on the Euro­pean Junior Squad.

Com­plet­ing her quest to qual­i­fy for Euro­pean Juniors in all the freestyle events was Emma Gra­ham, as she swam a time of 58.37. Emma was also in action in the finals ses­sion, com­pet­ing in the final of the 800m freestyle where she fin­ished 8th in a time of 8:53.23.

After an up-and-down 2008, Stephen Water­house came in to the 1500m freestyle today not know­ing what to expect. How­ev­er, any doubts proved unwar­rant­ed as he man­aged a 10 sec­ond improve­ment on his per­son­al best to clock 16:01.81.

Dip­ping under a minute for the first time in the 100m freestyle was Lucy Emer­son, who fin­ished strong­ly to clock 59.77.

Great Graham Kick Starts The Team in Sheffield

Posted on 16 March 2009

Emma Gra­ham qual­i­fies to swim two events at the Euro­pean Junior Cham­pi­onships as the club get off to a fly­er on day one of the British Gas Swim­ming Cham­pi­onships in Sheffield.

Emma Gra­ham, coached by Dave Calle­ja, clocked a 6 sec­ond per­son­al best in the heats of the 400m freestyle, to fin­ish in 4:16.82. Good enough not only for a place in the final, but also a seat on the plane to Prague as the fastest qual­i­fi­er for the Euro­pean Junior Cham­pi­onships lat­er this year.

In the final, Emma was just touched out into 8th place but man­aged to set anoth­er per­son­al best clock­ing 4:15.46 in a world-record break­ing race!

Emma also com­pet­ed in the 50m freestyle, swim­ming a 26.88 to qual­i­fy in 16th for the semi-finals and for anoth­er swim at the Euro­pean Juniors.

Also swim­ming the 400m freestyle were young­sters Danielle Hall-Jack­son and Lucy Emer­son, post­ing times of 4:23.07 and 4:28.49 respectively.

Sprint­er James Har­ri­son com­pet­ed in the 50m freestyle and set a best time of 24.13 but was unlucky not to make the semi-final in a tough field.

Great Job Guys! Keep it up!!