British University Swimming League Phase 2 2022
On Wednesday 2nd February the Blues Team travelled back to the Surrey Sports Park for the Phase 2 of the British University Swimming League. This competition was the head-to-head divisional final against the University of Surrey, Oxford Brookes and Brunel University.
The team from Oxford started the competition off with two strong medley relays from both the Men’s (Jackson Spry, Jonathan Rutter, Andrew Hong and Matty Johnson) and Women’s (Louisa Zolkiewski, Katherine McKane, Nina Holguin and Spencer Williams) teams, both securing solid second places.
Aggie Burns then took on the 100 IM finishing in a PB time of 1:12.02.
Jonathan Rutter then stepped up to absolutely smash the 100 Freestyle in a time of 50.52, narrowly missing out on the OUSC Record currently held by Jamie Towner, but he did succeed in securing a first place and maximum points for the team, and he swum a Blues Time.
Andrew Hong was quick to follow suit on the win, annihilating the competition on his 100 fly in a blues time of 55.69.
A quick turnaround for Jonathan proved not to be an issue. Winning the 100 breast in a time of 1:03.93, yet another Blues Time.
The excitement came with Louisa and Jonathan on the Medley Skins. The strokes were pulled out of a hat, and the slowest swimmer at the end of each 50m eliminated. The women’s races were fly, backstroke and breast and Louisa made it to the last 50 but just got beaten on the breastroke by the swimmer from Surrey, so secured us a second place.
Jonathan’s skin strokes were breastroke, fly then backstroke and he smashed every single race, only needing to do 5 strokes to complete the 50 breast, finishing in top spot yet again.
This winning high clearly rubbed off on the distance swimmers with Sophie Lawrence and Max Anderson-Loake both achieving their first Blues Time of the season on the 200 Free in times of 2:10.91 and 1:56.27 respectively.
Andrew and Jonathan were still hungry for more, and smashed their 50 fly and 50 breast in Blues Times of 25.76 and 29.23 respectively.
The gala ended with an 8×50 mixed freestyle relay. Matty Johnson led the team to an early lead, followed by Andrew Hong, Jonathan Rutter and Max Anderson-Loake. The girls took the second half of the race; Aggie Burns, Claudia Murray, Nina Holguin and anchored by OUSC legend Spencer Williams. An extremely close race, the team fought right until the end but narrowly missed out on the touch to the University of Surrey.
The total points were:
- University of Surrey – 113
- University of Oxford – 91
- Oxford Brookes – 67
- Brunel University – 30
The team finished in a solid second place which is a fantastic achievement. We are still waiting to hear whether that result has achieved a lane in the National Final.
This year has been fantastic as the debut of the British University Swimming League and we have thoroughly enjoyed racing the University of Surrey, Brookes and Brunel and cannot wait to see how it progresses through future seasons.
Well done to everyone who competed, 5 races won, 7 swims under the Blues Time and several PBs – it is looking very positive for Varsity Day!