Taz & Simon win 11 medals at Corby
19 Dec 2012
Pershore's new swimming duo take on the best in Northants.
Two Pershore Swimming Club team mates 10 year old Simon Sweatman and 12 year old Tazmin Pugh travelled to Corby's 50m International Pool in Northants to take on some of the best swimmers in the country in a top grade level 1 Winter Festival Open Meet.
For Simon this was only the second time appearing on the grade 1 stage and had a near impossible job of taking on the 11 and under boys (11/u) some who could be one and a half years older. For Tazmin she had to take on more in number of some of the best swimmers from some of the elite and bigger clubs in the Midlands.
Simon started in the lengthy 400m freestyle finishing with the first of many personal bests (pbs) for the weekend, reducing it by a massive 9 seconds to record 5:26.06 coming 7th in the group but at the same time the top 10 year old. Sweatman was next up in the 100m backstroke recording 1:20.37 again top 10 yr old but took his place on the podium to take bronze in the 11/u division. Another pb of 1:09.40 in the 100m freestyle and yet another bronze medal rounded off Sweatman's first day in style.
Sweatman's second day of competition began with the same determination, setting an incredible record breaking long course pool time of 30.48. It didn't take long looking through the 6 million records held by the ASA that Sweatman's unbelievable time was recognised as the 2ndhighest for a 10 yr old boy of all time for end of year ranking since records were kept. In fact the only boy ahead of him was the one who beat him at this very same Open Meet and only by just four tenths of a second being another talent for the future of Matthew Shipley from one of the top clubs in the UK 'Nova Centura' swim club from Nottingham. Not surprisingly this moved Sweatman moving him to 2nd in the UK end of yr rankings for the last twelve months, taking the 11/u silver medal with some pride for himself and his club. In the 200m free Sweatman again set a four second pb with 2:32.01 finishing 7th overall rounding off the weekend with 4th in the 200m backstroke with 2:47.94.
Unfortunately with flu symptoms setting in Tazmin Pugh's weekend began on Friday evening taking bronze in the 800m freestyle with a new long course pb in 9:56.89. A disappointing 4th place though still a pb of 2:18.95 in the 200m free was quickly forgotten when she came back taking bronze in the 200m back. A silver in the 100m fly in 1:09.73 was quickly followed by a great new long course pb in the 50m free taking gold in 29.83.
Her second day started with the 400m free finishing in silver medal position with a new pb of 4:51.48. A time of 1:10.81 saw Pugh take gold in the 100m back whilst in the last session of the day yet another silver medal was won in the 200m Individual Medley in 2:38.39 again another pb, taking silver once again in the last event the 100m freestyle in 1:04.45. Pugh finished the meet with two gold, four silver and two bronze medals but left still looking for those elusive qualifying times to match the 100m fly she has already achieved for next July's National Age Group Champs in Sheffield.
Pugh will be representing the County comprising Hereford and Worcestershire next February in the annual six-way Inter-County match against Cheshire, Warwickshire, Leicestershire, Staffordshire and Shropshire. This will be the sixth time Pugh has been called up by the County since being eligible over the last two years. January will be a busy month for Tazmin (yr 8 Pershore High School) as both she and Harry Sykes (yr 10 Bowbrook House) will competing for the first time in the semi-finals of the Pentathlon GB World Schools Biathlon being ranked 2nd and 5th respectively on the start lists in the UK being run at Macclesfield and Crystal Palace.Ian Pugh photo