Once again, the New Bridge Swimming Department has been very busy. The pupils have been working hard towards their distance swimming awards which used to be ASA and have now been re-branded as Swim England.

All of our young people have done extremely well and many have surpassed their targets! We have had a ‘bumper crop’ of ONE MILE (1600m) swimmers this year – three from Year 9, Thomas..

..Ethan..

..and Sarah..

Patrick from Year 11 also swam a mile and did his in aid of MECP2 Duplication UK, raising over £600 for the charity..

Four pupils have managed to swim themselves onto the New Bridge swimming plaque – Declan from Year 11 swam 500m..

Donna from Year 8 swam 600m Back Crawl..

Lewis from Year 11 swam 500m..

..and Kieron from Year 9 swam 550m..

Well done to everyone for all of your hard work and dedication which has helped you to achieve and exceed your targets. This praise also includes all of those who have achieved a New Bridge Award, these are just as difficult to get and need to be worked for just as much!

We have a new SUPER SWIMMER too! Her name is Kia from KS2APA at Hollinwood Academy. For two years Kia has been trying to overcome her fear of ‘the deep water’ and has sat on the steps but she has now finally managed to enter the pool properly and even enjoys it when she is in the water!

All our fantastic swimmers may well have been inspired by Mrs Cattermole who has been very busy winning an impressive array of awards herself. In April she competed in the Oldham Triathlon, Milltown Races which involved a swim, a cycle and then a run – she was declared the fastest lady swimmer, was the 2nd woman in her age group and came in 9th overall in a time of 1 hour 31 minutes. Not content with that, she then took on the Salford Quays, 3.8km Media City UK Swim Challenge in May and came 1st overall in a time of 58 minutes. To complete her hat trick, Mrs Cattermole then took part in the Great North Swim, Lake Windermere – a 2 mile swim that caused her no problems and saw her come 2nd in her wave (white hats), 3rd lady and 9th overall with a time of 49 minutes 32 seconds..