Great Yarmouth’s Winter Wipeout Gala gives Norfolk swimmers their last chance to gain county qualifying times.

Hosted by Great Yarmouth SC and held at the Sportspark UEA pool, the gala was well attended by swimmers from 11 different clubs, with Exiles Malta having flown over specially to compete.

Great Yarmouth had a large team and had success across the age groups, with both the youngest and most senior swimmers winning medals — Ava Patterson (9) took an excellent silver in the 100m backstroke and bronze in the 50m backstroke and men’s captain Ryan Webb (17) took gold in the 50m butterfly, 100m freestyle and 200m freestyle and silver in the 100m butterfly and 200m IM.

Ladies’ captain Anna Duffield (16) also led by example, taking silvers in the 100m backstroke, 50m backstroke, 50m butterfly and 100m IM and bronze in the 200m IM.

Amelia Dibble (11) achieved an impressive five gold medals (200m freestyle, 100m backstroke, 100m freestyle, 100m breaststroke and 100m IM) and four silvers (50m breaststroke, 50m backstroke, 100m butterfly and 50m butterfly). Jasmine Coleman (12) swam strongly to win gold in the 100m butterfly and bronze in the 200m freestyle and 50m butterfly and Anna Pearce (14) took an excellent silver in the 200m butterfly.

Oli Grimmer (13) and Rhys Jarvis (13) had some great races, with perhaps the best being their 50m freestyle heats. Oli dipped under the 30 second mark for the first time, always a big milestone, clocking 29.93. Rhys, who swam in the following heat, was just behind him in 30.05. Oli also took a brilliant gold in the 100m freestyle, where he smashed his old PB, and bronze in the 50m backstroke. Rhys swam strongly in the 100m freestyle, taking a bronze.

Jacob Zandbergen showed his usual consistency, winning four golds (50m backstroke, 100m backstroke, 50m freestyle and 100m freestyle).

The busiest swimmer of the weekend was Nathan Pitman (14) who competed in all 16 boys’ events, taking gold in the grueling 400m IM and 200m butterfly along with the 200m backstroke.

It great to see Mollie Medler back competing and achieving new PBs after an enforced absence due to injury. Megan Smith also deserves a mention for smashing so many of her previous best times, while Melissa Duffield took a brilliant eight seconds off her 400m freestyle.

The club had 115 new PB times out of 190 races and head coach Richard Every said: “I was proud to be the coach of our swimmers this weekend and look forward to great things in the future.”