Three Spencer swimmers were in winning form at the weekend at the South East Region 1500 freestyle championships at K2 Crawley.
Chris Dunn came home in a time of 22.47.90, knocking nearly 4 minutes off the British record and 2 minutes off the European record, to win the 80-84 age group.
Also winning their age groups were Jennifer Kelly (40-44) in 23.13.01 and Christine Lutsch (45-49) in 22.50.90.
Relay World Record
Chris then stayed on for the relay gala in the evening, joining up with Esther Iseppi (back), Amanda Heath (breast) and Clive Benson (fly) to break the world record for the 280+ Mixed Medley relay.
“We knew we had a chance of a World Record” said Amanda, “but after Esther fractured her wrist when we were in Abu Dhabi for the Open Masters Games last month, we thought it might be a tough ask. Almost fully recovered, Esther swam a great 100 backstroke leg and at the half way point we knew the record was within our grasp. Clive and Chris swam fabulous splits and we ended up over a second inside the old record, which was set in 2015 by a team from Tamalpais Masters in USA. Prior to that, Spencer held the record, with Esther (then on fly), Nigel Salsbury, Diane Ford and Geoff Stokes, so it’s nice to get it back again”.
The Team then went on to break Spencer’s European records in the 4x100m free (set last year at the same meet) and 4x50m free (set in Japan in 2023), and also broke the European record in the 4x50m medley held by a Hungarian team.
For their efforts, they were awarded the trophy for the Top Team performance.
Much further north, Suzanne Maidment was racing in Aberdeen, checking out the venue of the GB championships in June. Newly aged up to the 60-64 age group, she had some great swims, winning gold in the 200 breast and silver in the 200 and 400 free.