A GROUP of Kendal swimmers made the trip to Blackpool to swim in the Garstang Open Medals Gala.

Their efforts brought a heap of medals, qualifying times and lifetime bests.

It also gave a number of younger swimmers the chance to broaden their experience and participate in an 'away from home' gala for the first time.

For the 10 year olds entered, two came through with medal winning performances that left them very proud of themselves.

Eve Murray showed how far she has improved with a brilliant and determined piece of freestyle swimming in the 50m sprints, firing her way into the silver medal position.

A great start got her into a position for success and an immaculate turn kept her in the mix. Into the pressure zone and a storming finish she found herself just touched out of Gold by a split second.

Idris Morgan came out bursting with his usual confidence and gave his all again in the 50m butterfly sprint to come through and take a well earned Bronze medal.

Despite being outside the medals newcomers Abigail Greenwood, Alicia Crawford, Nicole Horner-Bourne, Reece Kinley and Jack Brockbank all got P.B,s with impressive swims.

Top of the tree though was 14 year old Ben Cudby who took four gold and a silver – just reward for the hard training he has done this year.

Opening his account with the 50m backstroke he found himself up against Garstang’s Jack Charmak.

Stroke for stroke they matched each other right to the finish where Cudby got the win on the touch. The 50m butterfly brought him gold again with a comfortable victory and he followed this up to clash again with Charmak in the 50m breaststroke where his immaculate stroke technique brought him another victory.

The table was turned however at 50m freestyle where despite a supreme effort Cudby had to settle for silver. He then went on to take his other gold in the 100m individual medley with a great all round swim.

Another who medalled every event was 12 year old Adam Stansfield who found himself in a tough age group.

Undeterred he took it on and performed brilliantly, mixing it with two Ulverston swimmers. At 50m backstroke, butterfly and freestyle he held his nerve to take bronze in each event.

Then he upped the stakes and fought his way into the silver medal position for the 100m individual medley and crowned his day with a fabulous 50m breaststroke sprint to tie for the gold medal in 46.00 secs and with Q/Times and P.B,s enjoyed his greatest success to date.

15yr old Oliver Beresford’s day was also full of success getting off to a great start in the 50m backstroke and setting a blistering pace he got an advantage to which his challengers had no answer and he kept his lead right to the finish for a well earned gold medal.

Still enjoying his sprinting ability he took silver for both his 50m breaststroke and 50m freestyle. He completed his efforts with silver again in the 100m individual medley having put in another compact all round swim.