South Yorkshire Open - 11th December 2016 

After a fantastic 2016, the EPSC Masters finished the year off in style with a successful trip up to Ponds Forge in Sheffield competing in the South Yorkshire Open. The masters squad brought back some early Christmas presents: 5 bronze, 12 silvers, 3 golds, and some tremendous personal bests. 

Sarah Hempenstall swam incredibly hard competing in every single freestyle event from the 400m down to the 50m in such a short space of time with a gold in the 200m free. Natasha Lane continued to chip away those vital milliseconds on all of her 50m events with a half second pb on the 50m fly the biggest improvement of her races. Rosie McMahon managed a 2 second pb on the 50m free, and a second place finish in a tight 100m IM final heat, a good return to competition swimming! A big thank you to Antonia Lufkin for taking time out of university and supporting the females in both medley and freestyle relays, with the ladies coming in a close 2nd in both events.

However, it was not just the EPSC ladies who stole all the glory. Mark Lufkin took over half a second off his 100m backstroke time, and picked up a well deserved silver in the 100 IM. Craig Singer finished the weekend with a 0.63 second pb in the 50m breaststroke and another half second pb in the 100IM. After swimming too fast in the relay and colliding with the wall Will Vincer managed to shake off a hand injury and pb in both the 50m and 100m free. His strongest race coming with a 1 second pb in the 100m free, some may say his additional streamline helped him towards that achievement! The apprentice followed the master as Dean Blackman, (another extremely streamlined male swimmer) managed to break the 26 second barrier in the 50m free and smash his 100m free masters pb by a whole second finishing with a 57.10. Funnily enough even I managed to get some good swims in with my best race coming in the 50m free getting a pb of 23.77. The men wrapped up the day with a bronze in the medley relay and a silver in the freestyle relay, overall a fast weekend for all of them.

Finally I would just like to say a big well done to all those involved in the weekend, and to the masters group as a whole keep up the hard work. It has been a pleasure to coach you all and hopefully your 2016 achievements can push through into the new year. Remember practice like you have never won and perform like you have never lost!

Glen Melson