Five members of the Borough of Kirklees Swimming Club have been in action on the national and international stage in Glasgow.
Kyle Chisholm, Dan Cross and Matthew Hinchliffe competed in the Commonwealth Games Trials, which doubled up as the British Championships, while Maisie Burnard-Martin and Jonathan Booth took part in the British Para International Championships.
The swimmers from the Senior Performance squad were well prepared for the step-up to the Trials and produced some excellent performances against the major names in British swimming.
BoK head coach Mark Lappin commented: “With TV cameras, call rooms and the full experience of being in the spotlight, this is what we train for - to enable our swimmers to attend this kind of event.
“This would not have been possible without the continued support of the Kirklees Active Leisure Swim Performance programme that provides the venues and training opportunities, and BOK the competitive outlet for the swimmers. This is a partnership working at the highest level”.
Chisholm, 16, Cross, 17, and Hinchliffe, 19, achieved a total of nine tough qualifying times to enable them to attend the high-profile event.
The young men produced fantastic personal best times over the five-day event, gaining positions in a number of final races.
The Para Championships took place straight after the British Championships, with the event ging the two BOK swimmers an opportunity to experience a full international event, with athletes from all over the world.
Both youngsters had a very successful competition, claiming a multiple personal best times, with Booth taking the Youth Champion title with a gold medal in the 400m freestyle.
Head coach Mark Lappin said of Jonathan’s performance “he handled the atmosphere like a seasoned professional, scoring our first National medal since KAL had taken the BOK training programme last year”.
Mark also commented on Maisie, who recently appeared on the BBC children’s programme Blue Peter: “what an experience for the young 13 year old swimmer. This is just the start of a very promising career within Para Swimming. Maisie handled the spotlight like an older swimmer, nothing phased her and she represented KAL and BOK in the highest possible way.”
Two other extremely successful events for the club have also taken place.
At the North East Regional Youth/Senior Championships at Sunderland in an event where swimmers aged 15-18 years can qualify for the relay teams for National Championships, Individual medals went to James Reidy, Jonathan Booth, William Garlick and the team medallists were Kyle Chisholm, William Thackray, Daniel Cross, James Reidy and William Garlick.
And five of the club’s swimmers attended the European Downs Syndrome Swimming Competition.
This was the first major event for Jack Drennan, who was not overwhelmed by the amount of focus as he was awarded with the title for the Male swimmer showing great attitude and sportsmanship.
Five new European records were also gained for the club by Ben Sweenie in the Mosiac Downs Syndrome Category.
