National Junior Swimming League (m11)

Finally we are ready to kick off this year’s competition!  The first gala is Sunday 22 April. Your Club contact has just been emailed the draw and contacts sheet.

But, there has been one change of venue – for Div 1 Gala 1.  Southend pool has maintence work and has cancelled on us.  We have moved this gala to Southbury Road Leisure Centre, Enfield. Check the fixtures page.

Warm-up is at 15.00 if you are at Barnet.  All other pools it’s at 16.30.

Host clubs remain as announced. Host packs have been sent out.  These include our Child Protection and Photography policy which must be prominently displayed by your nominated promoter.

Can all clubs who have not yet sent me their DBS list and hosts who have not yet named their promoter do so before the first event.

Team Managers – you shall submit your actual team sheet to me the day before the gala and bring a printed copy to the event – using the Excel template provided.

We wish you a very lively competition!

Welcome to round one!

The first date of our competition for 2018 is 22nd April.  I am in the process of gathering together for the mail-out all of the files and information clubs will need, which I will send in a few weeks.

For now: please note that all participating clubs (and there has been a couple more withdrawals), have paid their subscriptions and so we have the final list of competitors, which has enabled me to publish the draw – please see “fixtures” page to find out where you will swim.

Our hosts for round one shall be:
Thurrock
Harlow
Dunmow
Camden B

Clubs should have finished registering their new swimmers with the ASA, as the ASA began this process earlier in the year, however for our purposes you submit your list of swimmers on 31 March. Please DO NOT submit before I send out the round 1 files. I need you to use the appropriate forms to return your lists.

Thank you.

These will be confirmed at the AGM.  However so far we have:

Dulwich Dolphins confirming their withdrawal.  As Dulwich swam in Division 1, all other clubs are moved up 1 place. This means that Epping Forest DSC escapes relegation and remains in Division 1.

Two teams: Borough of Southend and Team Luton, withdrew in 2017 when they were unable to field a team. Rules state that they must re-apply in writing to the AGM if they wish to join Division 2 for 2018.

There has been a show of interest from Newham UEL swimming club.  We hope we can entice them to join our friendly league!

The Junior Inter-League Southern Area final for 2017 will be hosted by Nuneaton & District league.

This will take place at 13.00h on Sunday 1 October
at Pingles Leisure Centre, Nuneaton. CV11 4LX.

M11 JSL will be represented by this year’s winners: Camden Swiss Cottage. We wish them all the very best of luck and success.

A small amount of money has been spent on a re-branding exercise. You will have noticed our new colour scheme and logo above.  We welcome your comments and ideas for putting this branding to good use.

The initial concept is for it to help encourage participation and loyalty amongst swimmers in your club team.  Clubs may apply to me for the artwork and use this to create a “team” version of your club shirt or hat in preparation for our event. Swimmers will only be able to get their hands on this artwork if they turn out for their club team.

As of 2018, the winners of Div1 and Div2 will receive unique and exclusive medals embossed with the M11 Juniors logo.

There’ll be a reminder and agenda nearer the time, but the date for your diary is

Wednesday 15th November 2017
8pm at the Latton Bush centre
Harlow. CM18 7BL
(blue room, as usual)

Its most likely we’ll have a decision from the National League by then and may even be changing our programme for 2018

We also wish to remind clubs in this lull period before the AGM, that we are still offering grants of £100 to help young people gain their Level 1 Coaching Swimming award.

So far we have helped 3 young people from Harlow, Enfield and Thurrock.  We’ve had some “interest” from Epping and Hillingdon, and hope to reach our aim of spending £1,000 from our surplus funds.

Just a gentle reminder.  You have just a few days left to return to me any comment you wish to make about the proposed changes at National level and what we should do if these are forced upon us. I must respond before the end of July.  The gist of it is:

a) should we continue to have 9 year old events or change to 10-13 years
b) should we have 50m individual 9 year old events and do away with 25m
c) should the age-at date be changed
d) should the programme introduce IM

I’ve already had quite a varied response. Some clubs are happy to drop the 9 year events, some wish to keep them at 25m and some to go with 50m.  Its likely that our preference, if 9 year events are retained, will be to keep 25m at least for Div2.  Undoubtedly a lot of clubs struggle to get a 9 year old team out, although any club capable of winning Div1 will surely be able to do so.

Today I finally received the Chief Timekeeper Slips from the last two galas.  Unfortunately there has been some inputting errors. Most of these were minor but the Clement Hall results had a very significant typo, as well calculating for 8 clubs, not the 6 who competed.  This changed their result order significantly.

We are fortunate that the Clement Hall gala was the bottom of Div2.  So there is no change to the relegated and promoted clubs; and no change at the top with Camden remaining clear winners.

All amended results are now on the website.  And I have designed an improved recording spreadsheet which will allow inputters to see at a glance whether what they have done matches the finish order on the CTK slip.

But there is room for improvement, in terms of making sure we have a teamsheet from every club, collecting these in and sending them to me promptly with the CTK slips.  Clearly that is much more important for rounds 1 & 2 because it can affect subsequent draws if we get it wrong.

With thanks

The league has now finished for another year and I hope everybody enjoyed the competition, especially our new members.  Again a big thank you to the host clubs and to all our volunteers.

Although I still do not have all the Chief Timekeeper Slips in, looking at the spreadsheets I do not think any amendments will change the positions of the winners, promoted and relegated teams. So I have posted results here on the website.

Congratulations to Camden Swiss Cottage for winning the league. We wish them every success for the Southern Area Final and hopefully the national final later in the year.

The 3 teams promoted to division 1 are Hillingdon, Hackney Aquatic and Southend on Sea.  If any division 1 teams decide not to participate next year then more will be promoted.  The teams relegated are Epping Forest, Harlow and Luton.

As Luton and Bo of Southend withdrew from the competition, both teams will have to formally re-apply in writing before the date of the AGM. If they wish to rejoin the League this will be decided at the AGM.

It just remains for me to thank all our volunteers and hosts for running an efficient and fair competition, particularly Henry Watkinson and Matthew Hart who were a great support to me. I hope you have all enjoyed it.