Ealing Swimming Club made a very good start to this year’s London Region Summer Championships when they collected twenty gold, fourteen silver and eight bronze medals in the Youth competition. As Crystal Palace is currently out of action, the championships were held for the first time in the Club’s home pool of Gurnell which belied its reputation as a slow pool and was the scene of some very fast times. All the events were run long course and age bands were 14/15 and 16 and over for the girls and 15/16 and 17/o for the boys.

Gina Heyn (23) led Ealing’s medal haul with five golds. She dominated the 16/o breastroke events, winning the 50m, 100m and 200m races and also shone in the freestyle coming first in the 50m and 100m events and 6th in the 200m. Lauren Turner (14) and Joao Matias (21) both collected two golds – Lauren in the 50m freestyle and 100m backstroke with a silver in the 50m backstroke and Joao in the 50m and 100m butterfly with third place in the 50m freestyle and fourth in the 100m. Polly Kemp-King (15) won the 200m freestyle and was fourth in both the 50m and 100m events; Sophie Shafique (15) won the 200m backstroke with a bronze in the 100m and James Crawford (19) won the 100m backstroke but also gained four silvers – in the 50m and 100m freestyle and the 100m and 200m butterfly. In the distance events Luke Shewring (17) won the 17/o 1500m freestyle and Ramzey Crawford (17) won the 800m freestyle while for the girls, Emma Curran (18) won the 16/o 800m with Catherine Holton (16) second. Emma also came third in the 200m medley and Ramzey won bronze in the 200m backstroke.

Individual silver medals were achieved by Ramsey Haroun (15) – 1500m and 800m freestyle; Jenna Turner (16) – 50m freestyle with bronze in the 200m and fifth place in the 100m;  Cathy Surey (15) – 200m butterfly, David Hickman (18) – 50m backstroke,Tariq Miller (16) – 100m freestyle and Laura Curran (15) – 1500m freestyle. Holly Mills (19) won bronze in the 100m freestyle, and Daniel Crawford (16) was third in the 100m backstroke.

Finals places were achieved by Zak Shafique (16) (three events); Ramzey Crawford, Ramsey Haroun Holly Mills, Sally Moore (16)  Ellie Price (14), (two events),Daniel Crawford, Laura Curran, David Hickman,  Ed Howard (16), and Catherine Holton – all one event.

Ealing also did exceptionally well in the relay events. The girl,s team of Natalie Durant, Jenna Turner, Lauren Turner and Polly Kemp-King won all their events – the 4 x 100 and 4 x 200m freestyle and the 4 x 100m  medley and the boy’s team of Tariq Miller, Ed Howard, Zak Shafique and Daniel Howard was first in the 4 x 100m freestyle and medley and second in the 4 x 200m freestyle where Ramsey Haroun replaced Dan Crawford. Under national qualifying rules, the fastest twenty teams in the country including Wales and Scotland go forward to Nationals.The girls have qualified for all the events and the boys for the 4 x 200m freestyle and are currently first reserve for the 4 x 100m freestyle. The girls B team was also successful taking third place in the 2 x 200m freestyle race.

The next part of the London Region championships takes place on the 7th and 8th June – also at Gurnell.