Christmas Cracker Meet

Last weekend Derby Excel hosted our final meet of the year, a level 3 short course at Moorways in Derby. We had entries from 15 clubs, and entries closed in early October because the meet had reached capacity. It was held at the same time as Winter Nationals at Ponds Forge in Sheffield, meaning swimmers from many clubs were competing at both venues. 

Racing took place over two days, and there were many great performances from the swimmers. The full results can be found here: https://derbyexcel.swimresults.online/xmascracker25/

Top visiting club was Repton, followed by Nova Centurion and City of Birmingham. Corby were 4th overall, City of Leicester 5th, Nottingham Leander 6th and Long Eaton 7th. Well done to you all. 

It takes an enormous amount of hard work behind the scenes to deliver these events, which are so important to the financial viability of Derby Excel, as well as providing opporunities to race for the swimmers. Thank you to Promoter Rachel Male, Entry manager Kirsty Billinge, club Secretary Pippa Hibbs, club Treasurer Nisha Bains, and Chair Babs Ingram for organising the officials. 

Over the weekend, we had 17 officials training - one as a starter, 6 as Judge level 2, and 10 judge level 1. Thank you to everyone who mentored any trainees. If you'd like to train as an official, we'd be delighted to hear from you. Please email [email protected]

Thank you to all our coaches who helped on the day, plus the team managers, competitive stewards, announcers, H&S officials, and the admissions desk. We really couldn't do any of this without you.

A huge thank you to Parm Drayson and Raj Todd for organising a cake bake and Selection box collection. We raised over £300 for the Multiple Sclerosis Society and donated over 200 selection boxes to Derby Royal Hospital Children's ward.