Yorkshire Championships 2024 Roundup

It’s been a long, hard slog to get to the Yorkshire Championships this year. With the club still recovering from two tough years, low on numbers, add to the mix of another Head Coach leaving at the end of last year, feeder clubs struggling to find swimmers from the City’s Learn to Swim programme, which in turn has an impact on the number of swimmers the local clubs are able to send to Doncaster DARTES, and you have arguably a very difficult year where most would say “scrap it all and start again”.

Not with this group though……..

We all know this is now a rebuild of what was one of Yorkshires top 4 clubs, a long term project that many currently in the club probably won’t see the fruition of their own hard work and contributions in the years to come. However, with a lot of hard work, a lot of tears, unfortunate injuries and bouts of illness crippling us at times, we’ve come out of it with some very impressive results and a culture within the club geared towards hard work earns success. Yorkshire Champions in 13 events, 3 Silvers and 3 Bronzes, to add to that tally we have a great long list of finalists! A Massive achievement given the circumstances.

Swimmers from Doncaster Dartes Swimming Club competed in the traditional 3 rounds of high-level swimming competition, rolled out over three weekends throughout February.

The first weekend got off to a steady start with a handful of finalists and a steady stream of top 10 positions throughout the first weekend of racing in Leeds. The second weekend really opened the floodgates for medals and top 10 finishes with some spectacular swimming from so many of our young athletes stepping it up for the finals. With James Ellis going head to head with Hull’s Oscar Focht, James demonstrated the benefits of sprinting into the wall with a well timed finish to claim gold in the Boys 100m Fly with a time of 1:12.73, a time that also adds his name to an illustrious list of other Dartes swimmers. Oscar would go on to claim some revenge the following day during the Boys 100m Freestyle in a fantastic 4 way shootout to the finish with James coming out with a Silver Medal.

This year's Yorkshire Championships kicked off to an excellent start!  KUHSC were firmly on the medal table and a steady stream of top 10 positions throughout the first weekend of racing in Leeds. 

The penultimate day of the Yorkshire Championships saw some remarkable swimming, starting off with more medals to the tally with Jessica Hubery shaking off the previous weekends 1500m swim to claim the Bronze medal in the 800m Freestyle with a gutsy time of 9:46.61, taking a further 11 seconds off her PB set only in January and showing that consistency is key with her 50m splits never going into the 38s, a lesson learned and one that seems to have stuck.

It was a busy weekend of 50s - alot of PB’s and as usual a great deal of learning to take with us moving forward into the year.

Special mentions should be given to Lucas Lee, securing 10 Gold Medals.

The final day of racing and my personal favourite on the calendar, the Teams. A huge well done to our 9/10yrs Girls coming out with an unexpected Bronze Medal in the 200m Medley, 11/12yr Boys coming out with a bronze in the 200m Medley and our Girls 13 & Over Team who managed to final in both events despite some setbacks with injuries and withdrawals. Relay finalists included: -
Girls 9/10: 200m Medley 3rd and 200m Free 10th
Boys 11/12: 200m Medley 3rd and 200m Free 4th
Girls 13/14: 200m Free 8th
Girls 13 & Over: 200m Freestyle 9th

Some exceptional swimming from Doncaster Dartes SC was demonstrated throughout the Championships with amazing effort from everyone until the very last moment of the very last day. The team spirit was a highlight throughout the entire championships. 

For clubs to win medals at this level they need superstars. Athletes who either have that natural talent that can be polished with training, or hard workers who have the determination to force themselves into the reckoning. Both routes work and there are examples of each at the top of our medal table. The important bit for everyone is attention to detail. Leave no stone unturned, take on board what coaches tell you, fix what needs fixing and improve everything else.

Those superstars are the type who, if they have a weak kick, are determined enough to take that weakness and turn it into a strength. If they hate early mornings (everyone does), they are resilient enough to cope with that and keep on going. What can you do to make yourself a better athlete next season? Shock everyone around you, turn yourself into a superstar. It's your choice!
Thank you to all the hours of support from our Coaches and Team Managers and well done to everyone who took part. The hours in the pool certainly do pay off! You should all be extremely proud of yourselves and the commitment you all give.
#TEAM #TogetherEveryoneAchievesMore

Full list of medal winners and finalists: -