Information on Loughborough

Students strike gold at national BUCS swim meet

Posted on 19/02/2009

Loughborough University Website

Students strike gold at national BUCS swim meet

Loughborough University’s swimmers have retained all three titles at the BUCS Long Course Championships held at Sheffield’s Ponds Forge at the weekend (13-15 February).

The students, who between them won 24 gold medals and set four British University records, did the clean sweep to take the Men’s, Women’s and Overall Team trophies.

Liam Tancock (50m Freestyle, 22.83), Amy Smith (50m Freestyle, 26.05), Caitlin McClatchey (400m Freestyle, 4:11.04) and Sophie Casson (1500m Freestyle, 16:47.59) set the British University records, while Tancock also received the Top Male Performance of the Meet award.

Tancock was one of three Olympians to complete a golden hat trick (50m and 100m Backstroke, 50m Freestyle). McClatchey swam to victory in the 200m, 400m and 800m Freestyle, and Ireland’s Melanie Nocher grabbed all three Backstroke titles.

As well as claiming the 1500m Freestyle title, 23-year-old Casson helped secure a Loughborough one-two by taking silver in the 400m Freestyle and 200m Backstroke.

Jade Barclay took gold in the 200m Butterfly with teammate Kirsty Armstrong placing second. Both swimmers were also on the podium in the 100m Butterfly with Barclay taking silver and Armstrong the bronze.

Erin Jeffery looked impressive as she struck gold in the 400m Individual Medley (4:54.40) and backed up McClatchey in the 800m Freestyle with silver and a lifetime best of 8:57.86.

Sprint specialist Amy Smith was on superb form with gold in her record-breaking 50m Freestyle swim and silver in the 100m Freestyle (56.14).

Kate Hutchinson and Emma White secured gold and silver in the 200m Breaststroke, White also making the podium in the 50m and 100m Breaststroke events.

British international Euan Dale demonstrated his versatility with a winning swim in the 200m Individual Medley (2:04.03) after taking silver in the 200m Freestyle (1:51.23).

Joe Roebuck overcame illness to take the 200m Butterfly and 400m Individual Medley titles whilst Daniel Fogg swam a well-paced race to lift the 1500m Freestyle gold. Matt Bowe earned a well deserved victory in the 100m Butterfly with an impressive 53.89 second swim.

Loughborough blitzed the field in the Men’s and Women’s Freestyle and Medley relays - the men’s freestyle relay swimming inside the previous British Club Team record.

The Loughborough team also fielded a number of non scoring guest swimmers who set the pool alight with British Record breaking performances. Olympic finalist Lizzie Simmonds took down the 50m Backstroke with 28.61 seconds whilst the Men’s 4 x 100m Freestyle team of Ross Davenport, Ben Hockin, Grant Turner and Charlie Hockin set new Club Team record of 3:19.27.

Jo Jackson, not to be outdone, posted a superb 4:03.86 400m Freestyle to head this year’s World Rankings.

Director of Swimming Ian Armiger said “We are delighted with our results over the weekend. The swimmers always ride the wave of our great team atmosphere to produce outstanding swims.”

Final Team scores were:

Men 1st Loughborough 194 2nd Bath 141 3rd Stirling 127

Women 1st Loughborough 200 2nd Bath 127 3rd Stirling 43

Overall 1st Loughborough 394 2nd Bath 268 3rd Stirling 170

Keep up-to-date on everything Loughborough Swimming on www.loughboroughswimming.com