A slightly smaller than usual St Bede’s contingent swum at the South East Region Winter Championships.  Depleted due to injuries, the remaining 6 swimmers nevertheless acquitted themselves well and managed to get amongst the medals.

Stephanie Ketley(16), having looked good in training won 3 silver medals and took 2 National Qualifying times for 200m and 400m Free. Tom Lamb (17) was on fine form and was so unlucky to miss a hat-trick of National Times by fractions of seconds – he did however  take a fine Bronze medal in the 400m Individual Medley to make up for some of his disappointment.

Andrew Horsfall-Turner (15) making a name for himself as an Open Water swimmer this summer, took a well deserved Bronze in the 800m Free as he too moves ever closer to that elusive National Championship Qualification.
Ben Jones (14), Mary Carless (15) and Cristina Richards (14) also swum well with Personal Best times  to finish in the top 10 in several events.

Stephanie Ketley and Harriet Lambourne (16) have also been selected to join their fellow St Bede’s swimmer Michael Faber on the Advanced Apprenticeship in Sporting Excellence (AASE) programme run by British Swimming.

Head coach Kevin Ayers comments, “it’s great to have 3 swimmers on the AASE programme as it shows the strength that is developing in the squad at this level. Mike has just returned from a training camp in Cyprus and I am sure that this opportunity will start to deliver excellent results.”