KATERINA Avromova broke three of her own Bulgarian national records in the Mare Nostrum meet in Barcelona - an event in which six of Ealing Swimming Club's seniors pitted their wits against some of the world's fastest swimmers.
The 17-year-old set new benchmarks in the 50m, 100m and 200m backstroke and her 50m time of 29.65 was good enough for sixth place in the Grand Final, while her 100m time of 62.60 won the consolation final. Her 200m time of 2.16.26 also made her second in the consolation final.
Her times set new club and London Region records and should put her in good heart for the World Championships in Rome at the end of July.
Charlie Turner also had a successful meet, at what is a traditional opener to the international season and which followed a club training camp in Spain led by coach Dave Heathcock. He clocked 22.77 in the 50m freestyle (fourth place in the consolation final) and 50.67 in the 100m freestyle.
Gina Heyn also continued her recent good form, taking consolation final places in the 50m breaststroke ( 33.14), 50m freestyle (26.64) and 100m breaststroke (1.13.08). There were also consolation finals for Chris
Jones in both the 50m (29.81) and 200m breaststroke (2.22.42), and for Ian Hulme in the 50m butterfly (24.39) and 100m butterfly (54.94).
Joao Matias swam the 50m butterfly (26.06) and the 100m butterfly (58.00).
This group returns to Ealing now to prepare for the Scottish Nationals - which serve as the second half of the GB team trials for the World Championships - the National Youth and Senior Championships and the National Short Course Championships. [25cf] EALING's youngest swimmers stood out in last week's London Region Age Group Championships at the revamped Crystal Palace in South London - none more so than Elena Love.
The 10-year-old won a full set of medals for her three events, with gold in the 200m breaststroke (3.15.03), silver in the 200m backstroke (2.49.70) and bronze in the 200m medley (2.56.52).
Lucy Thornton took silver in the 100m butterfly (1.18.09), while Maisie Jameson claimed bronze in the 200m backstroke (2.50.19) as did Sian McDonnell in the 200m breaststroke (3.25.47) .
For the boys, Alex Bandarian won the 100m butterfly in 65.13, Tom Brommage claimed second spot in the 200m breaststroke (2.44.86), with Aaron Pullen and Omar Haroun also taking bronze in their 200m breaststroke events. Their times were 3.08.79 and 3.18.71 respectively.
Other finals places went to Eamon Haroun (100m butterfly and 400m freestyle), Ade Coker (200m backstroke), Callum Barrett (200m backstroke and medley) Cristian Rotundo (200m medley) and Laura McDonnell (200m breaststroke).
The boys' 4x100m freestyle and 4x100m medley teams were both fourth. The second half of the Age Groups Championships take place next weekend.
To complete a busy weekend for the club, the Junior League team of nine to 12 year olds were in action at Gurnell for Round one of the 2009 competition. The team had a comfortable win despite missing some swimmers who could not get back from Crystal Place in time, although 11-year-old Tasmin Norris swam her event at Crystal Palace - just missing the final - and then made a mad dash across London to arrive in time to win the breaststroke and help the 11 year old girls' medley team to a win.
Final result: Ealing 246 points, Windsor 221, Staines 200, St Ives 136, Wellingborough 122, Acton 90.
