In the opening round of the Sussex County Championships, traditionally the first of the long distance events, the St Bede’s squad totally dominated the pool. With only two age groups, 16 and under and Open, there were plenty of points up for grabs in a competition where the team is for once more important than the individual swimmer.
In the 800m Freestyle the under 16 girls took an incredible 6 of the top 10 places with Jasmine Brennan only just missing out on first place. With Stephanie Ketley joining them for the Open event this translated into another 6 of the top 10 places in the Open competition which was a truly fantastic achievement.

In the 1500m Freestyle the boys also performed well taking  three of the top 5 places  in the under 16 and four of the top 6 places in the Open competition.

St Bede’s amassed a total of 81 points with their nearest rivals on 32. Understandably Head Coach Kevin Ayers was delighted with the performance saying, “there were some truly gutsy swims and I’m now looking forward to Round 2!”.
Results as follows:

Girls 800m
Jasmine Brennan (14) 9.43.03 2nd (5th Open)
Mary Carless (15) 9.47.73 3rd (6th Open)
Rebekah Chapman (14) 9.57.38 4th (7th Open)
Katherine Horsfall-Turner (12) 10.04.33 6th (9th Open)
Eve Carless (13) 10.06.17 7th (10th Open)
Cristina Richards (14) 10.09.05 (11th Open)
Stephanie Ketley (17) 9.37.64 2nd Open

Boys 1500m
Ben Jones (15) 18.09.33 3rd (4th Open)
Andrew Horsfall-Turner (15) 18.17.18 4th (5th Open)
Will Condron (14) 18.17.42 5th (6th Open)
Tom Lamb (17) 17.55.21 2nd Open