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SNAPPETS Stadium Masters Swimming Club Inc www.stadiummasters.org.au March 2018

PRESIDENT The open water swim season is continuing and the small band of eight or nine club members involved is doing very well. Gavin and Oliver Cull and new member, Hamish Buddle, were in teams in the Rottnest Channel Swim last Saturday. Hamish and Travis O’Neill have entered the Port to Pub swim in March. Best of luck to these swimmers. The State OWS Championships are at Rockingham tomorrow. After this, the pool program takes over, starting with the Beatty Park 50s on 9th March. The National Championships are not far away, beginning on 18th April in “our” pool. Swimmers should be arranging their training to be prepared for these pool swims. I want to say that our oldest female and male swimming members are a model to us all: Pat Sugars (86) and William Curtis (80) are training session regulars. Where are the rest of you?

Club membership renewal has gone quite well. Unfortunately, we have had to say goodbye to a few swimmers.

As lane hire costs are greater than our income from membership fees, fund-raising is an essential part of the life of the club. We start off the year’s activity by volunteering at a triathlon on 11th March. This coincides with an open water swim so some members will not be available to help but there’s a second chance at the next triathlon on 15th April!

The committee is considering the year’s events and has yet to finalise the dates for our main social activities. Thanks to some members we have finally filled all but one of the support positions as follows:

Duty statements for these positions have been approved. The new Constitution has been submitted to the Dept of Commerce and the Bylaws will be sent to the membership shortly. Sponsorship by Venues West has been agreed for 2018/9. Last year the warm-up/cool-down lanes in the dive pool for our Club Challenge were not covered by the agreement. They now are.

See you at the pool! Barry Green

Volunteers needed for the Nationals 18-21 April

Swimming or not in the N18 Championships at HBF Stadium, don’t miss the opportunity to be involved as a volunteer timekeeper or runner. On the sheet in the cage please fill in the times that you are available.

Support Position Member Responsible

Recorder/Information Manager Chandrababu Veliath

Assistant Recorder (E 1000 swims) Peter Lyster

Registrar Ann-Maree Lynch Calnan

Membership Officer Barry Green

PR Coordinator Barry Green

Social Organiser Helen Green

Webmaster Jackie Egan

Safety Officer Stuart Gray

Social Member Liaison Officer Margaret Watson

Clothing Officer To be determined

Snappets Editor Merilyn Burbidge

In this issue

Regular features President ..........................1 Membership .....................1 Captain .............................2 SuperSnapper ...................3 Diary entries .....................3 From MSWA .....................3 Recorder ...........................3 Goggle ..............................4 Birthdays ..........................5 Social ................................5 Open Water Scene ...........7 Deadline for next issue .....8

Special features

Official of the Year ...........2 Welcome/Rotto crossing ..4

Attendance 2017 ..............6 Movie: Sea Donkey ...........8

Lane etiquette ..................9

Knitting project ................9

MEMBERSHIP: At 1st March 2018, Stadium Masters membership stands at

First claim swimming members 41 Social members 16 Second claim swimming members 4 Life members 2

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OFFICIAL OF THE YEAR

Our very own Pamela Walter is Masters Swimming WA Official of the Year for 2017! The presentation was made at the Council of Clubs meeting on 22nd February. In addition to officiating in a range of capacities at nearly all of the Club Challenges and other inter-club carnivals, Pamela has the complex task of rostering officials for all WA meets. Congratulations Pamela! The award is richly deserved. We’re very proud of you.

CAPTAIN Pamela Walter Top Ten in 2017 Of our 49 full members last year, 31 participated in a club swim, a LiveLighter Club Challenge and/or an Endurance 1000 swim. All of them gained a place in the State Top Ten. That’s pretty amazing. Time for a celebration!

Stadium Masters Club Records for 2017 You can view our Club Records to 31st December 2017 on the website: http://www.stadiummasters.org.au under the heading RESULTS, Club Records.

Club Swim Saturday 17th February A dozen swimmers took to the water for a 50 metres long course meet. Peter Gray hobbled in, having pulled a calf muscle in the long run out of the water at an open water swim that morning. He acted as Recorder and with Jackie, who is still recuperating from her knee op, as Starter that left others to concentrate on their swimming. Thanks to them, to Pamela for arranging the heats and to Graeme Walter for capturing the action on camera.

Many heats were excitingly close and times were very near to best for last year. Now we need to train hard and

try for better times at Beatty Park on 9th March or at the short course Club Swim on 10th March. It is always good to have lots of swimmers at a meet to allow more rest between swims and make heats more challenging and closer.

Graham Wimbridge 50 Back (PB/CR) Cas Brown 50 Back (PAB)

Graham Wimbridge 50 Fly (PB/CR) Dee Stephenson 50 Free (best since 2014

Graham Wimbridge 50 Free (CR) Bill Woodhouse 50 Fly (best since 2014)

Coaches displaying different start techniques: “Grab” on the left and ”Ttrack” on the right

All in together this fine weather!

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SUPERSNAPPER

Graham Wimbridge is SuperSnapper for February for achieving two PBs and three Club Records at the Club Swim on 17th February. Woohoo Graham!

Note: This year Graham has advanced to the 60-64 age group. At the Club Swim he took Kevin Wren’s original long course records for 50 Free (set in 1992, the year the Club was founded) and 50 Fly (1993) as well as William Curtis’s long-standing record for 50 Back (2001).

FROM MASTERS SWIMMING WA Appointment of New Executive Officer At the Council of Clubs and AGM meetings on 22nd February the board announced the appointment of Sophie Row as Executive Officer, commencing on 6th March. We look forward to welcoming her to Masters Swimming WA.

2018 National Championships Super Clinic

2:30 pm Sunday 18th March at HBF Stadium

Give yourself the best chance of performing well at the 2018 MSA National Championships by attending this swimmers-only clinic presented by Kim Tyler (Fremantle), Elena Nesci (Claremont) and Siobhan Wilkins (Perth City). The clinic will cover race skills – starts, turns, finishes, rating, kick speed, pacing – as well as giving some race

practice. It is for ALL standards and strokes.

DIARY ENTRIES FOR MARCH AND BEYOND

Date Event Time Venue Wednesday 7 March Movie: Sea Donkey 6:00 – 8:00 pm Lecture Theatre HBF Stadium

Friday 9 March Beatty Park 50s and relays warm-up 6:15 pm Beatty Park Pool

Saturday 10 March Club Swim, short course 3:30 pm warm-up Claremont Pool

Sunday 11 March Coogee Jetty to Jetty OWS 6:45 am rego Coogee Beach

Sunday 11 March Volunteering at Women’s Triathlon 6:00 am Whitfords Nodes Park

Sunday 18 March Super Clinic – preparation for N18 2:30 - 5:00 pm HBF Stadium

Sunday 25 March Mandurah LiveLighter SC Club Challenge 8:15 am warm-up Mandurah Aquatic Centre

Sunday 8 April Melville LiveLighter LC Club Challenge TBA Leisurefit Booragoon

Sunday 15 April Volunteering at triathlon early! Whitfords Nodes Park

Wed 18 - Sat 21 April MSA National Championships variable HBFStadium

Sunday 20 May Stadium LiveLighter Club Challenge 8:00 am warm-up HBF Stadium

RECORDER: Endurance 1000 files

As Assistant Recorder, Peter Lyster has taken on the task of

entering times for Endurance 1000 swims onto the Masters

Swimming Australia website. He has asked for all E 1000 files to

be left in the cage at the end of February. (Yes it IS already March,

but better late than never!)

Graham, a winner for the spots

and stripes!

Entries for Nationals If you intend to enter the Nationals, do it soon. Orders for merchandise close on 9th March.

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WELCOME We are delighted to welcome Hamish Buddle to Stadium Masters. Here’s what he says:

“G’Day fellow Club members!

Open water swimming is my focus at present. Last Saturday I completed my 15th Rotto crossing - no solos to date, 8 duos and 7 team crossings. This year I was in a team in the 150+ Male category. My team #Rotto19.7 finished in 3rd place in 5:00:35. That’s right, we missed the sub 5-hour mark by 35 seconds. Let’s blame the 4 metre shark for that! However we were at the 14.5km mark when the shark was sighted at the 12km mark so we were not affected. After the shark sighting race radio went ballistic with updates from race officials plus a number of comments from other skippers, some humorous, some pro sharks and some demanding that it should be removed or shot!

Interestingly although the ESE breeze helped blow everyone across it did mean that in the early morning (4:30am), the breeze had a high chill factor. Two of my team members didn’t do too well from this coldness. They shivered half the race and one was well and truly seasick. Perhaps a rookie mistake from them but one needs to be very well prepared for all conditions during the Rotto crossing.

Although the Rotto Swim is not without its dangers, I am convinced that this is still one of the best if the not THE BEST WA sporting event. I have another crossing planned in three weeks in the Port to Pub and then it’s time to get ready for the Nationals.

Swim to win!”

GOGGLE SAW

Captain Pamela trying out the new Scarborough Beach pool on the day it opened!

Oldest Club member Audrey Wren, who turns 93 this year, and heard her say she attributed her good health to drinking quality red wine. She was sitting outside the bottle shop at the Floreat Forum!

Cas upside down drying her hair under the hand dryer.

Pamela swimming in her gym gear, having forgotten to

pack her bathers. Negatives: her loose top wouldn’t stay “down” and the elastic in her pants had lost its punch so they wouldn’t stay “up”. Positives: her top worked well as a resistance training tool and as it swished around she could feel her freestyle rotation too.

June Maher swimming again after 7 weeks off.

CLUB CLOTHING

Please contact Pamela if you want a Club polo shirt or a basketball style cap. Swimming caps are usually available in the cage, too. Contacts: 9445 1549 pjdesigns@aapt.net.au

That’s me in the water about to

hand over to my team mate.

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THE TRUTH ABOUT ANN-MAREE Attentive readers will remember that new Committee member Ann-Maree made three statements in the last issue of Snappets, two of which were true and one which may have been either true or false. Here is the truth!

I lost my son in the Zimbabwean bush when he was 20 months old and found him some time later along a bush track in the company of monkeys. TRUE

I am colour blind. TRUE

I spectacularly wiped out at Pipeline in Hawaii in 1975. FALSE

March 3rd Matt Jones 6th Pamela Walter 8th Travis O’Neill 21st

Anne Edmondson

21st Richard Ingleby 23rd Geoff Barnard 25th Peter Gray

April 12th Stuart Gray

SOCIAL Farewell to Ciara Drumm Pamela Walter On the last Tuesday in January, a supper was held after training to say goodbye to Ciara who was returning to Ireland. Travis was sick and couldn’t make it, Gavin was away and a couple of others had work so it was a small but happy group who enjoyed an international spread of curry, naan bread, lasagne, salad and dessert. Stuart presented Ciara with an award for “being a cheerful and hardworking member at training and competition” and the group gave her a club beanie, which she will need back home.

Making the Most of Summer at Bold Park Marg Watson Maybe our Social Swimmers don't have 'times' and certificates to show, but they do have much to brag about! Hazel had her first swim in many, many months recently at Bold Park and was thrilled to do 500 metres. Zee is a marvel! She swims five or six hundred metres at Bold Park on Fridays, and again at Claremont on Mondays. Not bad for the 90-94 year age group! Madeleine is also a regular on Fridays. She has added to her routine of walking-the-dog in the morning with walking the 25 metre pool in the afternoon. Marg Somes clocks up 1000 metres each time. June H is getting over a fall that required surgery and hopes to be back in the water soon. Swimming with friends is ideal. We have a pool and surrounds that are perfect and coffee and bics to follow. What a way to make the most of summer!

60th Birthday

Chinese people believe that a person reaching the age of 60 has completed a full cycle of life. Following the 60th year, the person celebrates a new life. Hence the 60th birthday is celebrated with great extravagance. Go Anne!

Marg W, June H, Cas, Hazel, Marg S and Zee at

Bold Park on Australia Day

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WILLIAM TURNS 80!

To mark his new octogenarian status, William treated all thirteen swimmers at Claremont Pool on a recent Monday to an egg and bacon sandwich, after their swim

of course. He made it clear that everyone would have to wait for another ten years for that to happen again! He was chuffed with the hand-crafted blue fish that Stuart awarded him.

STADIUM MASTERS IN THE POOL AT HBF STADIUM IN 2017 Barry Green

Data are collated from the club diary and relate to swims in booked lanes at HBF Stadium only. Figures do not include other pool swims such as LiveLighter Club Challenges, Swimathon, State Swim, State Relays, Long Distance events or Club Swims. The numbers of swimmers include those on trial to join the club, as well as non-club members who train with us.

In 2017, in spite of Saturday sessions having been discontinued, the total number of swims increased! Further, all sessions showed an increased popularity.

YEAR 2016 2017

Swimming Membership 58 (including seven 2nd claim) 52 (including three 2nd claim)

SWIMS

Annual Total 2,615 2,723

Average Weekly (52) 50 52

Average per swimming member 45 52

Highest at one session 19 (at Wednesday afternoon) 18 (twice at Wed morning sessions)

Total number of sessions 302 282

SESSION AVERAGES

Tuesday 7 8

Wednesday AM 10 12

Wednesday PM 11 11

Thursday 6 6.5

Friday 12 12.6

Sunday 4 7

THANK YOU FROM ZEE

I was so happy to receive the Snappers card with so many good wishes from my friends. Glad to say that after a day in SGH the medical team sorted my problem out! Added a couple of extra pills to my list, and I am OK. Back to Bold Park on Fridays and Claremont Mondays. Thank you Snappers for your friendship.

KOS, Zee

One is 80; the other not far off!

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OPEN WATER SCENE Mandurah Masters Australia Day Swim, Doddi’s Beach, Friday 26th January 2018

Distance Age Group Time Age Group place

Peter Gray 4km 50-54 59:58 1

Pamela Walter 2km 65-69 42:26 1

Stuart Gray 2km 75-79 40:41 1

Barry Green 2km 75-79 46:34 2

221 swimmers participated, about 40 more than last year. The water was murky but not too rough, not too cold and there were no stingers. All swimmers received an Australia Day hand towel and age group winners scored a matching bigger towel.

Barry’s note: After I rounded the last (green!) buoy and was turning to swim in to the finish, I paused - a polite way to say I was stuffed and needed to catch my breath. A lady swimmer tapped me on the shoulder as she forged past and encouraged me to get a move on. That was no lady, but Pamela! She had started in the wave after mine and had caught me up. This was an enormous help to me and I finished in "fine" style.

Swimming WA Round 7: Sorrento Beach, Friday 26th January 2018

Distance Age Group Time Age Group place

Ann-Maree Lynch Calnan 2.5km Super Legends 50+ 1:00.46 10

On Australia Day most open water swimmers went south but Ann-Maree chose to go north to join a record number of 1120 swimmers in the Sorrento event. It was part of the Australia Swims initiative, a national awareness campaign by Swimming Australia celebrating the love of water from 20th to 28th January 2018.

Cott to Swanny, 2 km Saturday 3rd February 2018

It was very busy at the start at Cottesloe Beach. As well as 981 swimmers, others were in upright paddle, surf board paddle and beach run events. The course was into the breeze and into the current, making for a challenging swim and slower times. In years past the Cott to

Swanny was billed as 2.2 km. This year the stated distance was 2 km even though the event started and finished at the same points as before. Could this be the reason for slower times?

During the event, a tiny bird known as a white eye or silver eye was found floating in the water and brought ashore. Luckily one of the Swanny surf club members on the beach is a vet who works at the Perth Zoo. After she gave the rescuee a sugary drink, it revived and flew off. It took a bit longer for some of the swimmers to regain their strength!

Swimming WA Round 8: Rockingham, Sunday 4th February

Distance Age Group Time Age Group place

Ann-Maree Lynch Calnan 2.5 km Super Legends 50+ 55:09 5

Peter Gray 5.0 km Super Legends50+ 1:14:43 1

Age Group Time Age Group place

Mat Lovelock 30-39 36:55 40

Travis O’Neill 30-39 42:05 86

Peter Gray 50-59 30:46 3

Pamela Walter 60-69 48:23 12

Barry Green 75-79 51:17 4

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Swimming WA Round 9: Shorehaven, Sunday 11th February Distance Age Group Time Age Group place

Ann-Maree Lynch Calnan 2.5 km Super Legends50+ 51:45 2

Pamela Walter 2.5 km Super Legends 50+ 54:10 3

Stuart Gray 2.5 km Super Legends 50+ 50:14 7

Shorehaven is a new suburb halfway to Geraldton and infrastructure is still catching up. There were just two toilets available at the beach, one men’s and one women’s, so you can imagine the queue before the event! That really could be improved next year.

SunSmart Busselton Jetty Swim Sunday 11th February Club representatives in the very popular 3.6 km event were Mat Lovelock as a solo, finishing in 1:01:25 and Louise Norris with former member Lisa Dwyer in a duo, finishing in 1:17:11.

Rottnest Channel Swim Saturday 24th February Hamish Buddle’s foursome did very well to finish 3rd of 22 in the Male 150+ Teams. Mat Lovelock joined about two or three hundred others in the inaugural 3km swim around STS Leeuwin. He was a bit disgusted that it took him an hour. Slow, he said. It was good swimming out but on the return he was swimming on the spot into the wind.

SEA DONKEY 6pm Wednesday 7th March, John Bloomfield lecture theatre, HBF Stadium

The World Open Water Swimming Association award-winning film Sea Donkey highlights the training, qualification and successful swim across the North Sea from Ireland to Scotland by Guernseyman, Adrian Sarchet.

Testimonials include: “Captivating! The life of an adventurer of the highest order”: Steven Munatones - creator of Oceans Seven and World Open Water Swimming Association.

“The tension at the end is unbelievable”*: Outdoor Swimming Magazine.

Cost: $10 at the door to cover expenses. Two lucky people will receive door prizes!

Guests are experienced open water swimmers Shelley Taylor-Smith and Sue Oldham. They will answer questions after the movie.

Please let Stuart Gray know if you are coming: stu.gray@bigpond.com

* A word of warning: the tension at the end includes a few four-letter words!

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POINT OF ETIQUETTE: Letting Everyone Finish into the Wall

When you lead a lane, and finish into the wall at the end of a swim, within a set or at the completion of a set, please move to the right hand corner of the lane as you face the wall.

When the second person touches, they are to move to the right-hand lane rope.

The third person is to do the same, and possibly the next person too.

After three or four swimmers, the queue should then be formed on the left hand lane rope.

This allows ALL swimmers to finish into the wall and complete a full lap without having to stop a metre or two out from the wall.

Common sense is required so that the lead swimmer is not hampered in their take-off and arriving swimmers can still do a full lap.

Please respect others by leaving the end of the lane free at the centre.

WALL

Left lane rope

Swimmer 1 Right lane rope ← → Swimmer 5 ↑ Swimmer 2

Swimmer 6 Swimmer 7 Swimmer 3

Swimmer 4

KNITTERS Many thanks to everyone who knitted or crocheted poppies for the Remembrance Day 2018 installation at the Australian War Memorial, Canberra, to mark the Centenary of the end of WWI.

If you would like to knit 25 cm squares to be made into rugs, Elizabeth will arrange to give the finished rugs to Clutterbugs (http://clutterbugs.net.au/), an organisation that collects goods for women’s shelters.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS AND DEADLINE My thanks to Barry Green, Pamela Walter, Ann-Maree Lynch Calnan, Marg Watson, Jackie Egan, Zee Marsland, Peter Lyster, Elizabeth Edmondson and Hamish Buddle who have contributed to this issue. The deadline for the next issue is Friday 6th April.

Merilyn Burbidge mburbidge@westnet.com.au