Salisbury Masters hosted the final Wiltshire Swimming Championships of 2007 at 5 Rivers pool on Saturday. They were 10 5 points adrift from Swindon and hoped to close the gap in this home leg.
A month ago members of the Swindon team had competed at the European Masters championships in Kranj, Slovenia. Andi Manley and Jon Audis gained 2 first places each and the Swindon relay teams also won two gold medals, demonstrating that Wiltshire masters swimming has now reached a very high level.
During the meet 15 county records were broken, 3 of which were gained by Lorna Harding who has represented Salisbury since Masters swimming started in the late 1970's.
Against this background Salisbury had to dig deep and a number of very creditable performances were achieved, some by new club members. The ladies team held their own, winning overall top place. Nell Walker won the Walrus Cup for the most points gained over the year's galas.
Salisbury's youngest age group is growing in strength, Danny Raggett, Rob Langan, Harriett Lerwill, Katherine Cherry and Phil Muspratt promising great things for the future.
The final race of the evening was the men's blue ribbon event, the men's 50 metres Freestyle. Phil Muspratt was pitted against the recent European Champion over 100 metres: Andi Manley. Phil was closing on Andi in the final metres, only loosing out by 0.3 of a second. Both men had achieved a sub 25 seconds time at the end of a busy evening's swimming - an exciting and hopeful end to the gala from Salisbury's point of view. Swindon Dolphins 428 points - Salisbury were in second place with.401.
