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Sometimes chance discoveries are the best. A few weeks ago a blog called flylikeagirl started following the club on twitter. Curious I decided to check it out and guess what? I’m glad I did, it’s a gem. So we’re delighted to welcome Kelly (from flylikeagirl…) with a guest post, offering some warm insights from a US swim parent and the roller coaster of emotion that come with the territory…

I never really understood trials and finals meets! If I blew it out of the water and got a best time I would quit while I was ahead. It’s like winning the lottery and then expecting to win again. Except that the lottery is all about luck and swimming is about talent and hard work. The great sport of swimming. All about duplicating, recreating, improving and proving. In your face.

There is also the sport of parenting a swimmer. It is more of a sport of trials and tribulations. Parent your child well in the sport of swimming? Do it again.Do it better. Improve upon that. And then prove it. And then start over again.

Words: Maurice Mc Crohan.

Well we survived the winter then, it was a mild one!

The snow shoe and tyre makers are sunning themselves in the Bahamas on their pre Christmas sales profits!.The local authorities have EU butter mountain style piles of grit and sand that were not utilised !The early morning swimming runs never seem quite as daunting when you don’t have to get the scraper and the de-icer spray out! Think all the extra ten minutes nap or early morning stress we save when we peer out at the car bleary eyed and then stare out again bleary eyed and keep staring bleary eyed til we realise,we can’t see without glasses or contacts!

The club recently got together to honour the club’s top swimmers in 2011.

Coaches Jon Lambert and Paolo Di Paola made it clear that a combination of factors combined to make these swimmers stand out. It was not just top gala performances but hard work, dedication and acting as role models in and out of the pool which secured the awards in the B and Development Squads. Coach Alan Turner welcomed the fact that his decision was not made easy by the number of top swimmers in the Senior Squad. Its a good omen for the future that we have such strength in depth right across our three squads.

Well done to the following award winners;

Keara Caul, Michael Mc Grath, Matthew Burns, Jean Harling, Cian Cunningham, Sinead Mc Crohan, Faye Harling, Ben Griffin, Sean O’Brien and Conor Turner.

Click here for individual winners by category.

Words: Head Coach Alan Turner Images: Brian Whelan.

“…Well done to Andy on this brilliant achievement.

It’s even more remarkable when you consider the previous record stood for 23 years. Ironically it was held by an ex-Aer Lingus swimmer, Ken Turner. Andy set the new time by swimming the race in a negative split (the second 400m was faster than the first 400m). Andy’s time was an impressive 8 mins plus he broke the record during an early-morning event, never an easy thing to do.

Well done to all our swimmers who took part in the last short course meet of the season, roll-on the long course season!…”