This weekend saw the joint inaugural Durham University Old Boys weekend and inter-college swimming gala, writes Erin Pearson.
While many other University clubs have a strong Old Boys contingent this is the first time it has been attempted by the swim team and is hopefully something that will continue for many years to come.
Although only a handful of 'Old Boys' made it up for the weekend due to work commitments a good time was had by all and this can be built upon in future years. They certainly seemed to enjoy getting back into the student way of life with a visit to Klute. Ex-Captain, Matt Rogers said he was impressed by the camaraderie now found between team members.
The highlight of the weekend was the inter-college swimming gala on Sunday afternoon at Durham city baths. Again this had never been attempted before but compliments must go to Captain Jon Reilly for running a very smooth show! The aim was to attract new swimmers to the team and allow people who perhaps didn't feel they were good enough to represent the University a chance to compete. This was certainly achieved with twelve out of the sixteen colleges providing teams many of which were made up of pre-dominantly non-university swimmers.Each college was asked to provide four male and four female swimmers to compete in both individual and relay events. However this was not quite achieved in all cases and the university swimmers were able to help out and make up the numbers meaning all colleges were able to put out a team. Hopefully next year when word gets around what a great even this is even more swimmers will want to represent their college.
Although all a bit of fun the event did have a serious side; points were calculated and prizes given for the winners with teams being penalised for using university swimmers. There was a great turn out to Varsity for the presentation. In the Men's event it was Van Mildert who took top honours and Mary's for the ladies. Overall Van Mildert were relegated to third just one point above the 'Old Boys' who obviously haven't quite lost it yet! In second was Hild Bede and in first place with a massive 100 points was Mary's, although I think next year we might have to look at giving penalties for having too many water polo players in a team!
