News Collyer’s Make Waves At National Finals 18.11.2024

At the weekend, Collyer’s enjoyed success by winning the President’s Cup at the 65th English Schools’ Swimming Association Final, held at the Sandwell Aquatics Centre in Birmingham, purpose-built to host aquatics at the 2022 Commonwealth Games.

Team Captain Ella Thornburg said: “The Collyer’s team had qualified for the 4x 50m Freestyle Relay at Pavilions in the Park earlier this year. In addition, due to some withdrawals, the team also had the chance to retry a swim for the 50m Medley Relay, one length of the 50m Olympic size pool for each stroke.

“The 50m Freestyle, a strong stroke for the four, saw the team safely through the heats and into the final as the fastest state school qualifier with a strong swim. The final was swum to perfection and Collyer’s brought home the President’s award for the fastest state school with a time of 1:50.76, which was nearly 4 seconds faster than last year’s winner!”

With a quick swim down in the diving pit it was back into the Medley Heats. Despite being placed 29th place nationally, the group amazingly secured a place in the final (top 10 from the heats) qualifying second of the state schools, just 36 hundredths of a second behind the first and 7th overall.

The Collyer’s team comprised: Ella Thornburg (Crawley and Arun Tridents Swim Club), Rachel Houlgate (Arun Tridents Swim Club), Izzy Sawyer (Atlantis Swim Club), Skaidra Valmantaite (City of Brighton and Hove Swim Club), Lana Howells-Davies (Crawley Swim Club) and Alexia Mathieu Garcia de Movellan (Atlantis Swim Club).

Collyer’s Head of Sports Academy, John Burroughs, said: “The Collyer’s community could not be prouder of our swimming team’s exploits on the national stage.”

Ella Thornburg added: “Thanks to all our swimmers and to John Burroughs and Kelly Howell for helping to organise.”

For anyone who may want to watch back then it was live streamed on YouTube. The Freestyle final can be found here.