Making a splash
Rutherglen Amateur Swimming Club have enjoyed some success.
There was a tremendous performance, both in the preliminary three rounds, and the final at Ayr Citadel earlier this month for the club’s youngsters, in the Clyde Coast League.
The majority of the large clubs in south west Scotland take part in this series every year. This year there were 14 clubs in all, with swimmers aged from eight to 11 years.
Third place is the Rutherglen’s best-ever position ever. It shows the strength and ability of the club, being one of the smaller ones in the league, who were up against many clubs with a far greater membership.
The club has continued a steady growth over the last 10 years and is now recognised as producing some great young age group swimmers. It is one of the six clubs that form South Lanarkshire Swimming which, at national level, is now challenging to be the top age group club in Scotland.
There were some tremendous individual performances, but it was the team, and particularly the relays, that made a difference.
One of the big changes in this year’s campaign was the performance of the boys. In recent years the girls have led the way but this year, with some improvement still needed, the boys scored much better.
Head coach Lindsay Young said:“The whole club are delighted at the progress made this year despite the loss of a very strong 11-year-olds age group after 2014.
“After last year we did not expect to end up so strong this year, but hard work and team building both from swimmers and committed parents helped make this happen, not to forget the coaches.
“We will be looking for more eight-year-olds to join the club and prepare for next year’s competition, particularly boys. We also want to strengthen the existing squad, mainly by even better preparation next year.”
The third place trophy was collected by the team’s oldest girl and boy who will not be able to take part next year, Rona Easton and Jakub Bronski.
The best PB of the day went to Theo Monteith in the 100m backstroke. The toughest swim of the day, Jori Horn at 100m fly, saw the nine-yearold swimming an 11-year-old’s race.
Highest scoring swimmer was Maddison McCallum, winning all her events and relays, except one.