National Summer Meet medal success for RTW Monson swimmers

Swimmers from RTW Monson enjoyed a highly successful six days of racing at the Swim England National Summer Meet at Sheffield’s Ponds Forge, returning from the national competition with a superb haul of six gold medals, two silver, three bronze and a host of personal bests. 

The competition began strongly, with Gabriel Marsh making his national debut in the boys’ 400m freestyle. The 14-year-old produced a personal best to qualify for the final, where he went on to finish an impressive 10th. 

There was a standout performance from 15-year-old Oleksandr Mialkovskyi, who produced a huge nine-second personal best in the heats before going on to win the 400m freestyle title. His winning time of 16:59.06 in the 1500m freestyle later in the meet was also the fastest time among the 15-year-olds. 

Mae Davies, 15, also made her championship debut, finishing 13th in the 50m freestyle, while 17-year-old Madeleine Hind qualified for the final and finished sixth with a new personal best. 

Day two saw 15-year-old Olly Ratchford finish in 17th place in the 100m freestyle event, and Marsh qualified for the 13/14-year-olds final with another PB, before finishing seventh. 

Rohan Bissett, 16, produced a superb swim to take silver in the event. Lilly Deller, 17, also reached the 100m butterfly final, finishing seventh after a strong performance. 

There was further success on day three. Billie Ballach, 15, qualified for the 100m breaststroke final with a PB, finishing the final in fifth. 16-year-old Olivia Cooley qualified fastest for her final and delivered a brilliant race to win gold in 1:15.88. 

Lucas Sanders, 17, delivered an impressive performance in the 200m breaststroke, taking four seconds off his PB to qualify fastest for the final. Mialkovskyi then produced one of the meet’s outstanding swims in the 1500m freestyle, winning gold with a remarkable 35-second PB. His time was the third-fastest of the entire day. 

Day four saw 19-year-old Hayden Annan qualify for the 200m freestyle final, where he finished seventh, while 14-year-old Elsie Saffer made a great nationals debut in the 100m backstroke, knocking almost two seconds off her PB to qualify fastest for the final where she took the bronze medal. Jessica Gable, 19, also reached the final and claimed silver, continuing an impressive week of racing. 

The girls 200m breaststroke saw Billie Ballach qualify for the final, before finishing in seventh with another PB. Lowri Williams also competed in the 15-year-old category, coming in 13th, while Cooley produced another excellent performance to win gold in a thrilling race. 

The fifth day saw Gable qualify fastest for the 100m freestyle final. She then produced a storming swim to take gold in 57.04. Hind narrowly missed out on a medal, finishing fourth by just 0.2 seconds. Olivia Cooley added another medal to the collection, taking bronze in the 50m breaststroke. 

Thirteen-year-old Jax Marshall also made his nationals debut in the 800m freestyle, recording an excellent eight-second PB. The final day ended the meet on another high. Sixteen-year-old Bella Jones won bronze in the 400m freestyle with a PB of 4:33.94. Gable added another silver, this time in the 50m backstroke, while Bissett finished eighth in the 50m freestyle after recording a PB. 

Billie Ballach brought the competition to a close with a gutsy performance and another PB in the 200m individual medley.