WYCOMBE District Swimming Club are in the top ten clubs in the country for the first time in their history after a sparkling summer in the water.


The club, which has been running since 1932, is peaking at just the right time as it looks to move back into its newly-refurbished 50m pool at Handy Cross in the autumn.


It will go into the new era in the best shape it has ever been with 16 national medals won in 2015.
The club sent 24 competitors to the British Summer Championships, the ASA National Championships and the ASA National Open Water Championships and emerged as the tenth best club in the UK.


Head coach Kevin Brooks, who has driven the transformation, said: “These summer achievements can’t be underestimated. They are dazzling.
“Our club’s vision is materialising and this is only the beginning.”


Two major stars emerged from the British Championships in the form of 15-year-old James Eddy and 16-year-old James McFadzen.


Between them, they took home six gold medals and demonstrated superb backstroke swimming skills across all ranges of distance. McFadzen secured the gold in all his backstroke events – the 50m, 100m and 200m, plus a gold in the 200m individual medley, all in county junior record times and the 200m was also a county senior record. He also came away with bronze in the 200m breaststroke, slicing seven seconds off his personal best.


Eddy was also in sparkling form. He achieved a backstroke sprint double in the 50m and 100m events and was fourth in the 200m. In his gold medal events he almost broke the age group British record – an agonisingly close 0.32 seconds outside. He also set new South East Regional age group records for the 50m and 100m.


Timur Gulyiyen also shone. He competed for 13 days at the British and ASA National Championships and all of his swims were personal bests; with the majority resulting in finals. But his medal winning success came where it mattered – in the finals of the 50m and 100m breaststroke at the British Summer Championships. His times earned him a bronze followed the next day by a silver at his first National/British level event.


Other non-medallists at the summer championships who made the finals were Millie Sansome, who was fourth in the 50m backstroke in a new county junior record. She also came sixth in the 100m backstroke and ninth in the 200m backstroke. She also competed in the 4x200m freestyle relay with team mates Rachel Cox, Danielle Kidd and Sophie Millen, who reached the final and came ninth.

Meanwhile at the 1.5km Open Water Championships, Wycombe had Sansome (14), Sophie Millen (16) and Nicole Ryan (17) all involved with Sansome and Millen both winning bronze in their categories and Ryan taking sixth place.


But the following day, and back in the pool, Ryan smashed her personal best in the 800m freestyle to win gold, with Eddy also winning gold in a time of 59.21 in his first sub-60 butterfly swim.
Yusuke Legard, 18, won bronze in the 100m freestyle and reached the finals in two other events, all in personal bests.


But neither he nor the club were not finished there. He teamed up with Liam Jones, Luke Thomas and Jamie Baxter to win silver in the boys’ over-17 4x100m medley while the girls 14-16 year team of Sansome, Millen, Emily Bench and Kate Lees took bronze in their 4x100m medley relay.