Any early-to-mid summer birth date makes qualifying for the summer’s national age group championships tough, and for one of Reading Swimming Club’s top young performers it’s about as hard as it gets. Adam Barrett turns 13 on the first day of the championships, but swimmers have to qualify under their age on the last day. Four days younger and Barrett would sail into a whole string of events, but turning 13 at the end of July means he has to meet a much more exacting set of times.
Barrett is nonetheless highly ranked nationally in several swims, and reaffirmed his promise at the annual Wycombe Classic.
In a six-lane pool with a reputation as a difficult place to record PBs, Barrett, coached by David Wittig in Reading’s Age Group Squad, was in or near the medals in backstroke, fly, freestyle and individual medley events over distances between 50 and 200 metres.
His top performance came in the 12-and-under 100 back. A heat time of 1:12.95 was a whisker outside his previous best, but still secured pole position in the final, and Barrett made no mistake there as he took the gold in a new PB of 1:11.80.
Teammate Chris Boyce, not yet 12, gave another great performance as a 1.5-second heat PB took him into the final fifth-fastest and he repeated the placing there.
The 100 fly brought Barrett a silver. Although a 1:09.99 heat put him fastest into the final, Portsmouth's Daniel White, entered not far short of 1:17 and only fourth-fastest in the heats, swam under 1:11 for the gold. Boyce placed eighth but was beaten by only one 11-year-old.
In the 200 IM Barrett reduced his PB in both heat and final, qualifying third but moving up to pip the home club’s Edward Howard to the silver. Boyce was again eighth in a PB and again second among swimmers in the younger half of the two-year age group.
In the 50 free Barrett placed third in both heat and final and although Boyce was 10th, this time out he had only 12-year-olds ahead of him as both boys again swam personal bests. Further down the field, Conor Sandell improved his entry time by 2.5 seconds.
The 100 free was a similar story – Barrett third in the heats and fourth in the final, Boyce 10th in a huge PB. Although James Tichband finished in the 30s, his 1:15.06 beat his previous best by almost five seconds, showing the benefits of recent long-course training at Aldershot with Charlotte Zadrozny’s Development Squad introduced this season.
At the other end of the age range, Reading captain David Thomas put in an excellent 200 fly. The 17-year-old cut his entry time in the heat and improved further in the final after being called up from eighth as a reserve. A further PB there meant he cut his best from almost 2.41 before the meet to 2:37.64. Barrett placed ninth across all age groups and Kristian Statham 10th.
Sam Flory, 13, was another Reading success as he mixed with a field aged up to 23 in the open 200 IM. Several older swimmers tackled the heats cagily - Wycombe’s Alex Vine was way outside his entry time, but then cut his heat time by a full 14 seconds to win the final - but Flory did exactly the right thing for an age-grouper in this company and swam his own race.
Seventh spot in a marginal PB left him one place outside the final, but on being called up as reserve he PB’ed again for fifth spot in 2:43.78. Flory also recorded a solid PB of more than a second in his 200 backstroke.
Reading had two finalists in the girls’ programme, 16-year-old Charlotte Thompson and Ashley James, 12. Thompson, who starred in the 100 fly in 25-metre pools in Reading’s autumn Speedo League division-winning B team, qualified sixth in the event and repeated the placing in the final.
James placed sixth in her 100 back final and fifth in her 50 free, both after heat PBs. The 50 free heat was a particularly strong swim in 30.34, off a pre-meet best of 33.02. Lower down the 12-and-under field, Rachael Mills was within 0.10 of her PB and Frankie Wilkins and Natalia Ciecerska-Holmes – in her first meet at this level - both improved theirs. Wilkins also cut over two seconds from her 100 back PB.
Three Reading girls swam 50 fly PBs – Kristina Paige, Amy Thomas and Louisa Herring, the latter tackling only one day of the meet before joining head coach Graeme Thomas’s top squad on a training camp at the University of Bath. Beth Ayerst swam good PBs over 200 metres in both back and IM. Fourteen-year-old Louise Gillatt put in her best swim in the 100 fly, beating her entry time by well over three seconds, and Rheannon Sandell’s best effort saw her improve her 200 breaststroke PB by 1.5 seconds in 3:13.29 with good even-paced "splits".
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** Saturday sees the annual Berks and South Bucks county championships get under way at Maidenhead’s Magnet Pool. Over 60 Reading swimmers in various age groups will be taking part this year, a rise on 2004, although members of the Top Squad will join proceedings only the following weekend as coach Thomas takes a small group to Swansea for the for the annual Welsh Dragon meet at the 50-metre Wales National Pool.
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