Following the success of the Banbridge Academy swimmers at the Ulster Schools Swimming Gala at the beginning of February the team also had great success at the McCullagh International Open.  This is a yearly event arranged by Swim Ireland and held in Bangor and in recent years it has had Olympic Athletes from the UK and Europe attend. This year we had top athletes from Scotland, England and Wales attend to go against the best swimmers in Ireland, including some that had represented Ireland at the last Olympics and Northern Ireland at the Commonwealth games last year.

There was representation from Banbridge Academy pupils, representing Lurgan ASC Lisburn Swimming club and Banbridge ASC.

From the school representing Banbridge ASC was:

From the school representing Lurgan ASC was:

From the school representing Lisburn Swimming Club was:

Overall, from these Banbridge Academy swimmers there were 23 personal bests, 12 finalists and 5 medals.

Ciara Daly competed in the 50 Breast, one of her favourite events, Ciara knocked 1.7 seconds off her pb, finishing 17th and making the B final. In the final Ciara went better still, narrowly beating her time from the heats and finishing 6th in her final.  Anna McKernan competed in quite a few events over this competition, stretching herself from the shorter 100 events to the 800 Free. Anna set new PBs in the 200, 400 and 800 Free events, knocking an impressive 15 seconds off her PB in the 800. Anna also made the B final for the 200 Free.  It was great to see Aimee Dawson medal at this gala as she puts in lots of hard work and it’s great to see her hard work pay off. Aimee took Bronze in the 1500 setting a new PB, and then she brought her team home in the 4 x 100 Medley relay, with her team from Lisburn Swimming club, to take another bronze medal. A really pleasing result. Zachary Black made the B final in every one of his swims, setting new PBs in each final. He won the B final in both the 50 & 100 Breaststroke.  Alana Burns-Atkin set new PBs in all of her events. The surprise of the competition was to finish 3rd behind two Olympians in the 50 Fly, getting closer to breaking the 28 second barrier. In the 200 Fly Alana only narrowly missed out on claiming gold but had to settle for silver but was happy to come away with another PB. The final day brought the 100 Fly, and she smashed her PB and went in first to the final. The final was close but again Alana had to settle for Silver, missing out on Gold by 0.13 seconds.  Her sister, Samantha Burns-Atkin, had been carrying a shoulder injury and so was only able to get qualifying times in the 100 and 200 breaststroke. However, she showed that this wouldn’t hold her back, setting a new pb in the 100 Breaststroke and narrowly missing out on the B final. In the 200 Breaststroke she smashed her PB by 6 seconds, going 1st into the B final. In the B final she was pushed all the way and came second by the smallest of margins; she did though knock another 3 seconds off her pb. An incredible swim against swimmers much taller and older than her.  Tara Kennedy, only competing at this gala for the second time, had a solid swim in the 400 free, finishing just shy of her pb. In the 200 IM she fared much better and set a new PB in a stacked field, she finished a very respectable 27th.Sophie Black competed in the 13 year old category for the first time at this gala. Unfortunately, Sophie was carrying a minor injury so couldn’t perform to her best, however she still put in some excellent performances, setting a new PB in the 200 Free. Sophie managed to get into the finals for all three of her events and narrowly missed out on the medals, finishing 4th in both the 200 Back and 200 free.

This was a tough competition held over three days, heats were in the morning with finals held in evening. The format had open finals, an A Final and B final as well as an age group final for 13-14 year old boys, and 13 year old girls. All Banbridge Academy swimmers can be proud of the performances they put in over the weekend. For most of them the next major competition will be the Irish Open LC Championship which also doubles up for trials for the National squad. Good luck to all that go on to compete at this gala.