1st Round Arena League Win 2015

 Arena League Nuneaton 10th October 2015

 

A fantastic start to this year’s Arena League. Orion managed to finish in first place at the Pingles Pool in Nuneaton.

A great performance from the Team as a whole. When the results were read out I was flabbergasted to hear that Orion were in the lead. There were some astonishing swims from all of the other participating clubs, which gave me the impression that we could possibly be in last position. How could we be in first place? The answer was revealed when I looked at the Recorders Results Sheet. No, the additions were correct. There were three teams with more first places than Orion. Hinckley had twelve first places, Coalville had ten and Oldbury nine, we had eight. The astonishing aspect of Orion’s Team was that while the other Clubs had last places, remember that there are fifty events and therefore fifty last places with the exception of a few disqualifications, Orion did not record any last places. A wonderful achievement. This consistency in the standard of the swims is vital to achieve good results. WELL DONE SWIMMERS.

The open swimmers found that the other clubs had one or two top class swimmers. First to swim was Jo Longland in the 200m Individual Medley. This was a very good swim from Jo with a very good time but this was the first shock to the system. Jo came fifth. How good were the other Clubs? My assessment of the possible outcome of the gala for Orion was going downhill. Matt James came first in the mens 200m Individual Medley, the second race, a bit of relief. The third race was where we were going to show the other clubs where our strength lay, was what I was thinking, the 11 years girls freestyle team, until I saw an eleven year old swimmer from Coalville swim a twenty nine second swim on the first leg, game over I thought. But eventually I could see that the Orion Team were performing well ( “you can’t start a sentence with a but” my English teacher used to say, well I have just managed it).

Girls 11/u Team of Ella Blyth, Ruby Couzens, Ellie Sibbald-Perkins and Imogen Viney had three third places, two second places and Ruby  came first in the 50m butterfly.

Boys 11/u Team of Stef Davies, Joe Day, Daniel Hindle and Karnell Nunes-Smith had one fifth place, one fourth place two third places and Karnell came first in the 50m breaststroke.

Girls 13/u Team of Niamh Bevan, Jodie Carreon, Rosa Day, Maya Graves and Grace Rees had one fourth place, two third places, two second places and the medley team came first.

Boys 13/u Team of Amir Behrouz, Althaf Bukhari, Asha Gurung and Daniel Hindle had two third places, two second places and two first places. Althaf came first in the 100m butterfly and Alex came first in the 100m freestyle.

Girls 15/u Team of Holly White alone had the younger swimmers coming to the rescue and they swam up an age group. This put a lot of pressure on the younger swimmers. This team had two fifth places, three fourth places and one second place. Well done Holly all alone.

Boys 15/u Team of Bruno Benegra, Nick Draisey, Gabriel Hicks, Michale James-Thomas and Robin Lacey had one fifth place, one fourth place, three third places and one second place.

Ladies Open Team of Esthel Carreon, Jo Longland, Alice Miller and Mollie Wilson had four fifth places, one fourth place, one third place and one second place.

Mens Open Team of Darren Barber, Phil Hodgson, Matt James, Joe Sadio and Daniel Snushall-Smith with some assistance from Bruno Benegra in the 6 x 50m freestyle had four second places and three first places. Matt had two wins, one in the 200m individual medley and one in the 100m breaststroke. Jo won the 100m backstroke.

One note of interest. The Mens Open Team came second to Oldbury in the 6 x 50m freestyle.  I was in shock when this happened. Hopefully we will meet Oldbury again so you can get revenge, come on swimmers. I am sure this will get back to the Oldbury ‘old guys’ so they might be up to the challenge again next time.

We will need a good effort from everyone in the second round of the Arena League which is on the 14th November so keep training hard. I have already had a  binding contract from Daniel Hindle who is going to smash his best times in the next round, after a year of little movement. That’s the attitude Daniel.

 

Coach - Carl