LEINSTER DISTANCE & GRADED Series #1 - A GREAT Success !!!

The Competition season started last weekend in the NAC with our first Distance & Graded Meet of the year.

The format remained the same as usual with the Distance meet being split Morning & Evening and the Graded meet in the middle of the day. All in all it was a hugely successful day for the Team with our more accomplished athletes, training twice on Saturday and racing on Sunday. The focus of the weekend was on racing well and pacing the events properly. Morning swims saw Eoin Mongey take on the 800FC for the first time whilst Dayna Clegg, Niamh Murphy & Grace Branagan raced in the last heat of the 400Fc with Katie Kelly, Jessica Tate, Naoise O'Driscoll, Niamh Bryson, Eva Martin, Michelle Larkin, Niamh O'Keeffe & Ciara Feighan, delivering strong swims in the earlier heats. In the PM Daire O'Driscoll, John Martin, Brian Feighan, Graham Field, Conor O'Keeffe & Eoin Mongey swam in the faster heats of the boys, whilst the younger boys Tiarnan Murphy, Conor Doyle, Luke Dillon, Oisin Phelan, Cilian Phelan, Jonah Clegg and Jack Higgins showed the way in their distance freestyle events with big PB's too. Tiarnan Murphy had a mammoth day of racing planned as he chose to race both meets and Saoirse Bryson took on some challenging events with a super swim in the 200BF. Michael Devitt swam a strong 200BS in a good PB and in the later afternoon Daniel McGrane-Maher added a good result in the 400FC to his earlier short swims.

In the middle of the day we saw a large team of our junior athletes compete in the Graded meet with many delivering multiple PB's throughout the afternoon. The Team showed how hard they have been working on Technique and skills as they delivered a MASSIVE 65PB's from just 79Swims. That's a TOTAL of 82% of all swims in the afternoon.

Sandra & Colm looked on as the athletes did themselves proud with all their hard work.

Many athletes will have delivered multiple PB swims in a short time, showing how they are getting fitter and technically more consistent with each competition they race.

A special mention to Jack Higgins on his 100% delivery of PB's in both the Distance & Graded meet over the day. Well done to him!!

Also a big congrats to Muirin Goulding, David Martinez-Dunn, Stephen Herlihy & David Rigg on their first Gala in the NAC and to ALL other athletes who swam so well on the day. Great family results too from sisters Rebecca & Jessica Burke, Katrin & Anastasia Kychygina and Rachel & Alex McGrane-Maher. The Bros' too were well represented with Eli & Daniel McGrane-Maher and Rory & Ciaran Fleming adding some great PB swims over the course of the day.

Our final siblings saw Caolifhinn & Cathal Tan join forces for the day with Eoin Feighan ensuring that as the youngest of the swimming Feighan's, he too delivered 100% PB's for the day.

Sharon Casey put together some excellent PB swims & led the way in her events as she combined with each of her team mates David Rigg, Muirin Goulding, David Martinez-Dunn & Stephen Herlihy to deliver some strong swims and some great results.

Well done to the TEAM on a job well done. The season has kicked off in style and it's important now to finalise some key targets for the next few months and get after them daily in training.

Just Remember

"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellent therefore, is not an act, but a habit"